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THE    GOLDEN    RIVER 


BY    MAJOR    JOHN    W.    HILLS. 


Demy  8vo.  (9x5|).      $3.50 

A   HISTORY  OF   FLY   FISHING 
FOR  TROUT 

"Major  Hills'  extremely  valuable  book  .  .  is  a  pretentious 
and  even  laborious  survey  of  the  literature  of  fly-fishing. 
It  is  the  first  effort,  so  far  as  this  commentator  knows,  to 
trace  the  history  of  fishing  with  artificial  flies  from  its 
beginning  at  the  close  of  the  fifteenth  century  to  the  present 
time.  ...  It  is  a  book  well  worth  adding  to  one's  library 
even  if  one  be  not  a  devotee  of  the  gentle  art." — The 
New  York  Herald. 


FREDERICK    A.    STOKES    COMPANY:    PUBLISHERS. 


THE    FALLS    OF    IGFA7F. 


(Frontispiece.) 


THE 

GOLDEN  RIVER 

SPORT  AND  TRAVEL 
IN    PARAGUAY 


BY 


)  J.  W.  HILLS  AND  IANTHE  DUNBAR 


NEW    YORK 
FREDERICK  A.  STOKES   COMPANY 

PUBLISHERS 


Printed  in  Great  Britain  by 
~WHITEHKAD  BROTHERS  (WOLVERHAMPTON)  LTD. 


CONTENTS 

PAGK 

CHAPTER    I. 

The  Arrival  at  Posadas      -  1 

CHAPTER   II. 

The  Lelia  13 

CHAPTER   III. 

The  Dark  Highway  -  20 

CHAPTER    IV. 

The  Falls  of  Iguazii  28 

CHAPTER    V. 

An  Indian  Hunter  -  34 

CHAPTER   VI. 

The  First  Day's  Fishing  40 

CHAPTER    VII. 

At  Puerto  Mendez  49 

CHAPTER   VIII. 

Guayra  59 

CHAPTER   IX. 

The  Big  Fish  66 


CONTENTS  (continued). 

PAQI 
CHAPTER  X. 

The  Falls  of  Guayra  71 

CHAPTER    XI. 

A  Good  Day  at  Dorado  82 

CHAPTER   XII. 

The  River  of  Misfortune      -  94 

CHAPTER    XIII. 

The  Last  Day's  Fishing      -  102 

CHAPTER    XIV. 

What  the  Dorado  is  112 

CHAPTER   XV. 

Tackle  and  Outfit  120 

CHAPTER    XVI. 

Other  Fish  133 

CHAPTER    XVII. 

Life  on  the  Launch  -  139 

CHAPTER    XVIII. 

Downstream  154 

CHAPTER   XIX. 

The  Chaco  163 

CHAPTER   XX. 

The  Birds  -  -  -       173 


LIST  OF  ILLUSTRATIONS 

TO   FACE  PAGE 

Map  4 

The  Falls  of  Iguazu  Frontispiece 

A  Paraguayan  working  man     i  _ 
The  Mate  drinker                         J 

In  the  Paraguayan  market  10 

Tree  Ferns  on  the  way  to  Iguazu  1 

V       •  ~  /Co 

Through  the  Monte 

"  A  curved  stretch  of  waterfalls  "  30 

"  Smooth  sheets  of  white  and  pale  amber  "  32 

The  little  hunter  and  his  dog      1 

On  the  Lelia 

The  Lelia  j 

The  Funicular  at  Puerto  Mendez      j 

At  Guayra  *) 

A  Paraguayan  country  house       J 

A  real  big  one 

By  breakfast  time 

A  likely  spot 

Hooked 

The  first  rush 

Downstream 

Stopping  him 

He's  coming  up ! 

Nearly  in 

Now  the  gaff 

Safely  aboard 

Unhooking  him 

In  the  Rio  de  Desgracia  -  98 


88 


LIST  OF  ILLUSTRATIONS  (continued). 

TO  FACE  PAGE 

At  Agua  Dorado          1 

\    -  -  -  -       102 

A  brace  01  beauties     J 

The  bag  at  La  Cueva  del  Toro    1 

Weighing  a  Pacii  I 

Unhooking  i 

A  Forty  and  a  Thirty     / 

The  evening  and  the  morning     •» 

Fishing  near  Colonia  I 

On  the  Alto-Parana  -       130 

A  brace  of  Pacii 


The  Piranha  J 

Forty  pounds      ) 

A       "   11  (  ~  "  -  -       144 

A  smaller  one     J 

The  Captain's  Dorado  ) 

on      n      L    •  •  I       '  ~  -        148 

Ine  Captain  poses  again       J 

Iguazii      -  -       158 

The  Chaco  i 

The  Rio  Negro     I 

An  Ocelot       i 

AT>  c     -  •  •  "  -       loo 

A  Peccary       J 

A  Paraguayan  deer 

A  v 

A  young  boa 

) 
/ 


i 
( 

Camp  in  the  Chaco 

) 
/ 


In  the  Chaco 
Camp  in  t 
Pato  Real 

A  Railway  (  !)  in  the  Chaco 
A  Railway  in  the  Chaco          l 
Crossing  the  Rio  Negro  / 

Drying  the  meat  1 

A  Paraguayan  stag         / 


CHAPTER    I. 

THE    ARRIVAL    AT    POSADAS. 

For  a  day  and  a  half  we  had  made  our  way 
to  Posadas,  our  railway  carriage  hitched  to  a 
fruit  train,  with  its  empty  waggons  which  were 
to  come  back  laden  with  oranges.  Rain  had 
come  on  soon  after  our  start,  and  drove  across 
the  bare  stretches  of  country.  We  were  travel- 
ling north,  getting  further  and  further  from 
the  larger  towns  and  their  neighbourhood. 
Durham  and  Hereford  cattle  had  given  place 
to  long-horned  criollo  stock,  which  stood  knee 
deep  in  the  swampy  grass.  The  country 
stretched  in  a  rolling  line  to  the  horizon,  with 
bunches  of  trees  at  far  intervals,  which  marked 
the  whereabouts  of  small  estancias.  Birds 
became  scarce,  houses  few  and  far  between ;  and 
behind  us  the  two  shining  rails  ran  to  so  fine  a 
point  that  they  became  one. 

Sometimes  we  passed  muddy  rivers  where  the 
undergrowth  along  the  banks  was  almost  sub- 
merged, and  the  branches  were  littered  with 
weeds  and  drift  wood,  and  the  debris  brought 
by  the  yellow  flood.  A  solitary  heron  fished 

B 


2  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

disconsolately  amongst  the  reeds,  by  a  dug-out 
canoe  moored  to  a  tree. 

A  mournful  country  it  seemed,  seen  through 
a  blur  of  rain :  with  now  and  again  a  small 
one-roomed  mud  rancho,  with  a  few  draggled 
hens  trying  to  shelter  in  the  doorway.  The 
country  showed  no  undulations.  In  the  grey 
driving  rain  it  stretched  away  in  sombre  tones  to 
a  grey  horizon.  The  remains  of  dead  cattle  and 
horses  lay  here  and  there,  and  occasionally  a 
peon,  huddled  in  his  poncho,  sat  motionless  on 
his  horse,  to  watch  the  train  go  by. 

Where  were  '  the  tropical  scenes '  to  which 
we  had  looked  forward  ?  No  blossoms  were  to 
be  seen  in  the  fields,  except  patches  of  the 
brilliant  little  scarlet  verbena;  though  tobacco 
plants  flowered  along  the  railway  track,  and 
tiny  blue  irises  grew  between  the  sleepers. 

We  reached  Posadas  in  sheets  of  relentless 
rain,  with  a  sky  so  overcast  that  it  seemed  it 
could  never  be  blue  again.  But  after  tea  the 
rain  slackened,  and  we  set  forth  to  explore  the 
town.  The  road  from  the  station  led  up  hill, 
and  was  fissured  with  huge  cracks  and  channels, 
down  which  the  water  ran  turbid  and  red.  For 
the  soil  is  red,  as  deep  in  colour  as  Devon 
earth.  A  jagged  line  of  clearing  sky  showed 
in  the  west;  the  trees  hung  their  dripping 
heads;  and  from  the  scattered  houses  people 
peered  out  to  watch  us  pass.  Bushes  of  datura, 
drenched  with  rslin,  stood  in  the  untidy 


THE    ARRIVAL    AT    POSADAS.  3 

gardens,  each  heavy-headed  creamy  flower 
pouring  a  runnel  of  water  from  its  throat  to 
the  ground. 

As  we  reached  the  town,  suddenly  it  cleared. 
The  setting  sun  turned  the  sky  crimson,  and 
made  the  ragged  little  place  a  city  of  romance. 
The  pool  of  sunset  sky  was  rose-red,  and  rose- 
red  the  glistening  streets.  The  telegraph  wires 
became  threads  of  silver,  on  which  the  rain- 
drops hung,  translucent  as  pink  tourmalines. 
And  with  the  rapid  dusk,  lights  began  to  show 
in  the  houses.  An  open  doorway  gave  a  glimpse 
of  a  shadowy  inner  garden,  and  the  thin  sound 
of  a  guitar  came  down  the  street.  The  little 
plaza  was  deserted  and  silent,  the  figure  of  its 
central  statue  reflecting  a  gleam  here  and  there 
from  the  lighted  shops.  Dark  foliaged  trees 
surrounded  it,  and  the  ground  beneath  them 
was  slippery  with  bruised  and  fallen  flowers. 
It  was  fast  growing  dark,  and,  with  the  warmer 
air,  the  hidden  orange  trees  gave  out  gusts  of 
fragrance. 

The  hiss  of  the  rain  was  over,  and  the  wet 
earth  stirred  and  breathed.  We  had  come  upon 
the  poor  little  town  in  a  happy  moment :  day- 
light would  have  shown  us  its  tawdriness  and 
poverty.  But  now  it  was  mysterious  and 
strange,  touched  with  sudden  poetry.  The 
houses  stood  shadowly  along  the  raised  pave- 
ments, and  were  nothing  more  than  washes  of 
flat  tone,  broken  by  vague  hollows  that  were 


THE     GOLDEX     RIVER. 


doors  and  windows;  except  where  some  gleam 

of  light  fell 
across  the  road, 
quivering  in  the 
puddles,  and 
making  an  arch- 
way or  building 
leap  suddenly 
out  of  the  dark- 
ness. Knots  of 
men  stood  talk- 
ing in  liquid 
Spanish. 

Exultantly 
we  felt  we  were 
in  a  strange 
land,  on  the  eve 
of  adventure. 
And  perhaps 

the  rain,  at  which  we  had  grumbled,  had  helped 
to  heighten  this  mood.  Only  the  walls  of  our 
railway  compartment  stood  between  us  and  a 
new  world.  Our  lit  compartment,  strewn  with 
fishing  rods,  guns,  ammunition  and  stores  of 
every  kind. 

On  the  morrow  we  were  to  start.  Somewhere 
out  in  the  darkness  lay  the  great  river  we  were 
to  explore.  And  Posadas,  poor,  meretricious 
Posadas,  had  decked  herself  in  beauty  to  greet 
us. 


Tropic_  jpf_  Capricorn 


The   ChaLCo 


:*^o         ^ 


Asuncioin 


< 
b 

sr 
yij& 


\Guayra. 


(^ 

-  -<^— 5v^H^=^^  "j*"     ""    ^- 

j&jT^zza^ 

> 


N 


O 


Gepy    Estob.,  London 


THE    ARRIVAL    AT    POSADAS.  5 

By  day,  Posadas  became  a  very  different 
place.  It  was  a  crude  little  town,  with 
straggling  streets  that  branched  out  in  every 
direction  from  the  nucleus  formed  by  the  plaza 
and  the  few  better  shops,  and  that  dwindled 
away  into  the  frayed  edges  of  the  country. 

The  civic  life  of  the  place  centred  in  the 
plaza,  with  a  full-blown  statue  of  Liberty  in 
its  midst,  a  small  bandstand,  and  seats  under 

trees  covered  with  purple 
or  yellow  flowers.  Here 
the  inhabitants  crowded 
in  the  evening,  whilst  the 
band  played  airs  from 
light  operas,  and  the 
girls  of  the  place  walked 
in  parties  of  five  or  six, 
with  linked  arms.  So, 

\   TOTS       t00'  did  the  y°Ung  men? 
f  \  (($((       and   for  the  most  part 

these  groups  passed  and 
repassed  each  other,  with 
feigned  indifference.  If 
a  youth  wanted  to  talk  to  the  girl  he  admired, 
he  walked  on  the  outside  of  the  line  of  girls, 
and  made  himself  agreeable  to  them  all ;  but  it 
seemed  an  unwritten  law  that  he  must  not  break 
their  ranks.  Elderly  couples  sat  peacefully  on 
the  benches,  watching  the  young  people  pass  : 
and  parents  herded  along  small  children,  who 
lingered  to  stare  at  the  band  and  the  electric 


6 


THE    GOLDEN    RIVEE. 


globes  that  shone  like  strange  fruit  in  the 
branches.  In  the  daytime  there  were  few 
women  of  the  better  class  about.  They  kept  to 
their  shaded  houses  till  the  heat  of  the  day  was 
over,  and  then  emerged,  very  fresh  and  spot- 
less, to  walk  in  the  square  and  see  their  friends. 
We  wandered  about  during  the  day,  up  the 
uneven  streets,  and  leaving  the  few  better 
houses  with  walled  gardens  behind  we  made  our 
way  down  to  the  river.  It 

is  very  wide  C~  ^^      here,     and 

forms     the  r^^T  'f      boundary 

between  \    -$&r        Argentina 

and   the   low  ^^\w          wooded 


THE    ARRIVAL    AT    POSADAS.  7 

shores  of  Paraguay.  In  the  docks  were  the 
river  steamers,  that  run  from  Buenos  Aires  to 
Posadas,  and  the  smaller  boats  that  ply  between 
the  latter  town  and  Puerto  Mendez.  Barges 
and  lighters  were  crowded  in  the  harbour,  being 
loaded  with  oranges,  from  carts  heaped  with 
golden  fruit,  standing  axle-deep  in  the  water. 

Across  the  brimming  river,  which  is  about 
two  miles  wide  at  this  point,  lay  the  little  Para- 
guayan town  of  Encarnacion :  a  tiny  ferry 
steamer  plied  backwards  and  forwards,  and 
brought  the  Paraguayan  women  to  market  in 
the  early  mornings.  The  market  was  held  on  a 
small  hill  above  the  river,  under  the  shade  of 
some  trees,  where  a  breath  of  fresh  air  came 
from  the  water.  Each  booth  was  sheltered  with 
a  rough  thatched  cover  or  a  piece  of  matting. 
Oranges  were  sold,  mandioca,  eggs,  Indian  corn, 
fried  cakes  and  vegetables.  The  women  were 
not  uncomely.  The  poorer  classes  in  Posadas 
wear  a  loose  garment,  like  a  bedgown,  coloured 
or  white;  and  a  handkerchief  bound  tightly 
round  the  head.  Their  feet  are  bare,  and  they 
carry  themselves  well,  with  heavy  baskets 
balanced  on  their  heads.  They  are  chiefly  a 
mixed  race,  partly  Indian,  and  partly  of  the 
province  of  Misiones,  and  talk  a  mongrel 
Guarani. 

The  Paraguayans  are  a  very  marked  type. 
They  are  olive-skinned,  and  have  small  fine 
features  as  a  rule,  set  in  a  face  curiously  wide 


a 


THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 


across    the    high    cheekbones    and    jaw,    and 
narrowing  down  suddenly  to  a  tiny  pointed 

chin.  Their 
hair  is  fine  and 
dark,  and  the 
brows  pencilled 
and  arched. 
The  men  are 
slender  limbed, 
with  small 
hands  and  feet; 
and  are  dressed 
in  shirt  and 
trousers,  with 
soft  felt  hats, 
and  a  knotted 
handkerchief 
round  their 
necks.  The 
women  are  of 
sturdier  build, 

and  wear  bright  cotton  dresses,  with  a 
handkerchief,  often  poppy  red,  tied  over  their 
heads.  Both  men  and  women  have  sad  faces. 
And  the  story  of  their  country  is  a  sad  one. 
Under  the  benevolent  autocracy  of  the 
Jesuits,  they  reached  a  certain  status  of 
civilisation,  and  the  country  was  prosperous; 
though  doubtless  with  a  prosperity  that 
benefited  their  masters  more  than  themselves. 
Still,  they  were  protected  from  aggression. 


THE    ARRIVAL    AT    POSADAS.  9 

When  the  Spanish  rule  was  overthrown  in 
1814,  they  were  as  helpless  as  sheep,  under  the 
domination  of  their  own  rulers.  The  reign  of 
the  ruthless  Dictator,  Lopez,  left  the  country 
drained  of  men  and  money.  In  a  mad  ambition 
to  become  the  Napoleon  of  South  America,  he 
waged  war  on  Brazil  and  the  Argentine,  and 
dreamt  of  ruling  a  vast  kingdom  carved  from 
conquered  lands.  Every  man  was  pressed  into 
the  Army,  and  even  boys  of  fourteen  and  fifteen 
were  forced  to  fight.  He  built  a  church  in 
Asuncion,  in  which  he  intended  to  be  crowned 
Emperor;  but  his  death  in  1870  took  place 
before  it  was  finished.  It  took  place,  however, 
too  late  to  save  the  country.  A  whole  male 
generation  had  been  sacrificed  to  his  ambition, 
and  Paraguay  was  left  a  nation  of  women  and 
small  children.  By  now  the  second  generation 
has  grown  up,  but  it  seems  stamped  with  the 
sorrow  of  its  race.  Exploited  by  foreigners, 
ringed  about  by  hostile  neighbours,  the  lovely 
.country  has  little  strength  left. 

The  Paraguayans  we  saw  in  the  market 
brought  their  fruit  and  poultry  across  the  river 
by  the  ferryboat  every  morning,  and  returned 
at  night.  Both  men  and  women  smoked,  or 
chewed,  huge  cigars;  and  every  woman  sorted 
her  oranges  or  arranged  her  vegetables  with  a 
large  cigar  hanging  out  of  the  corner  of  her 
mouth.  Tobacco  is  one  of  the  industries  of  the 
country,  and  is  very  cheap. 


10 


THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 


looked     gay 
the   sunlight 


and 
that 


The     line     of     booths 
picturesque,    fretted   with 
filtered  through  the  branches. 
The    bright    dresses    of    the 
women,     the    glow    of    the 
heaped     oranges,     and     the 
warm   madder   of   mandioca 
roots,     made    an    attractive 
picture.     The  air  was 
so  still  that  the  blue 
smoke     of     the     tiny 
wood  fires,  on 
which    the 
mate*    kettles 
were    kept 
hot,     never 
wavered: 

and,    outside   the   small   oasis   of   shade,    the 
atmosphere  danced  and  shimmered  with  heat. 

On  our  way  back  we  passed  the  ramshackle 
little  huts  on  the  outskirts  of  the  town. 
Perched  on  wooden  legs  they  looked  like  dilapi- 
dated bathing  machines,  and  quite  unfit  for 
human  habitation,  even  in  a  country  of  blazing 
sunshine  and  few  wants.  The  doors  stood  wide 
open,  so  that  the  poor  interiors  could  be  clearly 
seen.  A  bed  with  mosquito  curtains,  a  gramo- 
phone, a  chair  or  two,  and  a  few  pots  and  pans, 
comprised  the  furniture.  The  more  wealthy 
boasted  a  sewing  machine  as  well  as  a  gramo- 
phone. Here  dwell  the  sirens  on  whom  the 


THE    ARRIVAL    AT    POSADAS.  11 

up-country  workers  spend  their  hard-earned 
money  when  they  come  to  Posadas  to  'see  life.' 
Many  of  the  roofs  are  in  holes,  and,  after  a  day 
of  rain,  bedding  and  furniture  have  to  be  hung 
out  in  the  sun  to  dry.  Of  gardens  in  the  usual 
sense  of  the  word  there  are  none,  but  each  hut 
is  surrounded  with  huge  bushes  of  datura, 
scarlet  flowered  pomegranates,  white  jasmine 
and  orange  trees.  Even  the  telegraph  wires 
have  orchids  growing  on  them. 

The  railway  ends  at  Posadas,  and  the  train  is 
run  on  to  a  ferry  and  taken  bodily  across  the 
river  to  Paraguay,  where  it  starts  afresh  on 
another  line. 

Walking  along  the  railway  track  by  which 
we  had  come,  we  found  a  tangle  of  vegetation 
on  either  side  the  line.  Butterflies  crossed  and 
recrossed  our  path,  and,  with  a  sudden  whirr, 
a  humming  bird  darted  into  sight,  to  hover  over 
a  bed  of  scarlet  cannas.  Even  their  brilliant 
colour  was  dimmed  by  his  burnished  radiance. 
He  was  barely  three  and  a  half  inches  long,  his 
breast  emerald  green  where  the  light  caught  it, 
grey  in  the  shade.  He  hovered  over  the  flowers, 
darting  his  long  bill  into  first  one  then  another  : 
then  preened  himself  on  a  twig  close  by,  show- 
ing no  fear  of  us.  Then  away  he  darted  again 
and  disappeared.  The  flight  is  so  direct  and 
swift  that  it  is  impossible  to  follow  with  the 
eye,  and  in  a  moment  he  blends  with  the 
brilliant  background  and  is  gone.  But  can  any 


12  THE    GOLDEN    EIVEE. 

traveller  ever  forget  the  little  shock  of  pleasure 
with  which  a  first  humming  bird  flashed  upon 
his  sight  ? 


CHAPTER    II. 

THE   LELIA. 

Had  it  been  possible  to  quench  our  spirit  of 
adventure,  surely  the  rain  would  have  done  it. 

Hour  after  hour  it  poured  without  ceasing; 
and  our  railway  carriage  stood  forlornly  in  a 
siding,  with  the  water  spouting  from  its  roof. 
Disconsolate  figures,  huddled  in  wet  cloaks, 
splashed  past  occasionally,  on  bare  brown  legs. 
The  red  earth  grew  more  and  more  porridge- 
like  in  consistency;  the  station  yard  more  and 
more  like  a  lake.  And  still  it  poured.  But 
the  little  motor  launch  Lelia  was  to  be  ready 
some  time  during  the  day,  and  we  longed  to 
board  her,  and  feel  we  were  really  off.  We  were 
told  we  should  be  miserably  uncomfortable,  our 
quarters  would  be  cramped,  the  rain  might  go 
on  for  weeks,  our  crew  would  give  us  trouble. 
But  we  paid  heed  to  none  of  these  things. 

At  last,  at  five  o'clock  in  the  evening,  it 
still  raining  hard,  the  launch  was  sighted 
coming  round  the  point.  And,  in  the  pouring 
rain,  we  got  our  baggage  across  to  her,  slither- 
ing and  slipping  on  the  wet  gangway. 


14  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

Mackintoshed,  and  with  their  backs  to  the 
driving  storm,  our  new,  acquaintances  waved 
us  goodbye;  and  in  half  an  hour  the  mist  and 
rain  had  swallowed  us  up. 

Meanwhile,  in  some  dismay,  we  looked  round 
upon  our  new  domain,  whilst  the  engines 
rattled  and  snorted  along,  and  the  whole  boat 
shook  and  trembled  with  the  vibration. 

She  was  about  seventy  feet  long  and  the 
saloon  took  up  twenty  feet  of  this  space.  A 
leather  covered  seat  ran  all  round  it,  and  a  door 
at  the  further  end  opened  on  to  the  crew's 
quarters,  the  engine  room,  minute  kitchen,  and 
washing  place.  At  the  other  side  of  the  saloon 
two  sliding  doors  led  to  the  tiny  deck  at  the 
bows,  and  the  captain's  look  out.  The  luggage 
had  all  been  brought  in,  and  stood  about, 
dripping  moisture :  packing-cases  of  tinned 
foods  were  mixed  up  with  suit  cases,  rugs, 
sacks  of  biscuits  and  ammunition  boxes.  The 
steel  floor  was  glistening  with  mud,  brought  in 
on  the  porters'  feet.  It  was  cold,  it  was  wet. 
Everything  danced  and  rattled  with  the  vibra- 
tion of  the  motor  engines.  But  at  last  we  were 
really  off,  and  that  was  all  that  mattered. 

The  boxes  were  stored  away  under  the  seats, 
things  hung  up  on  pegs,  wherever  things  could 
hang,  tins  were  opened,  and  hot  coffee  made. 
Gazing  at  the  old  leather  stuffing  of  the  seats 
and  the  shabby  appearance  of  the  boat,  we  felt 
some  apprehension :  and  our  fears  proved 


THE    LELIA.  15 

justified,  alas !  But  with  sundry  subsequent 
scrubbings  with  kerosene  and  boiling  water, 
and  a  wholesale  ripping  away  of  the  leather 
seats,  the  boat  became  trim  and  clean. 

We  spent  three  most  happy  weeks  on  the 
Lelia.  A  curtain,  hung  at  night  across  the 
saloon,  made  two  bedrooms  of  it,  and  our 
mattresses  were  laid  upon  the  floor.  That  first 
night  we  did  not  sleep  well.  The  captain  had 
brought  us  to  in  the  shelter  of  a  large  island,  and 
there  we  anchored.  But  the  rush  of  the  flood- 
water  past  us,  the  rattling  of  the  chain,  and  the 
unfamiliar  surroundings  and  sounds,  meant  a 
wakeful  night. 

We  woke  in  the  first  flush  of  dawn,  to  a  gleam 
of  sunshine  and  a  clearing  sky.  Little  by  little 
the  grey  skirts  of  the  rain  trailed  slowly  away ; 
and  as  the  day  brightened  we  found  ourselves  in 
the  middle  of  an  immense  river  from  which  the 
mists  were  rising,  with  low  wooded  banks  on 
either  side.  Already  we  had  left  the  town  far 
behind  and  our  way  now  stretched  before  us, 
up  this  expanse  of  tawny  flooded  water,  flecked 
with  foam,  and  darkening  almost  to  black  below 
the  trees  which  overhung  its  distant  banks. 

At  noon  we  tied  up  again.  The  sun  had  come 
out,  and  the  sodden  earth  steamed  in  its 
warmth.  A  mud  hut  or  two  stood  on  the  bank, 
in  a  little  clearing,  and  a  thousand  scents  rose 
from  the  dense  undergrowth.  Butterflies 
quivered  on  broad-leafed  plants,  drinking  in 


16  THE    GOLDEN     RIVER. 

the  sun.  The  torn  leaves  of  plantains  showed 
emerald  green  against  the  sky,  and  scurrying 
white  galleons  of  clouds  were  all  that  remained 
of  yesterday's  storm. 

After  lunch  two  of  the  party  went  ashore 
with  their  guns,  but  saw  no  game,  the  under- 
growth being  too  dense ;  and  in  a  short  time  the 
launch  started  again.  In  this  fashion,  day 
after  day  slipped  peacefully  past.  At  night, 
we  tied  up  at  the  nearest  good  anchorage  :  and 
at  dawn  we  woke.  After  an  early  breakfast 
the  engines  were  again  started;  and  seated  in 
the  bows,  we  watched  the  river  as  it  raced  past, 
the  dense  foliage  of  strange  trees,  with  a  gleam 
of  wild  oranges  in  the  tangle,  the  lonely  white- 
sanded  bays,  the  changing  green  walls  of  the 
forest. 

We  were  following  the  same  route  by  which 
Sebastian  Cabot,  in  the  early  part  of  the 
XVIth  century,  sought  the  Eldorado  which  was 
rumoured  to  lie  far  up  the  great  tropical  rivers. 
He  had  sailed  a  certain  distance  up  the  Parana, 
then  turned,  and  went  up  the  river  Paraguay, 
which  joins  the  former  a  little  above  the  town 
of  Corrientes.  These  two  great  waters,  with 
those  of  the  Uruguay,  eventually  form  the 
immense  estuary  of  the  Rio  de  la  Plata, 
the  River  of  Silver,  so  named  by  the  early 
Spaniards,  from  the  legends  of  untold  wealth 
to  be  found  at  its  source. 

These  mysterious  great  rivers,  hurrying  from 


THE    LELIA.  17 

the  unknown,  bearing  on  their  flood-water 
scraps  torn  from  distant  banks,  branches  of 
strange  and  aromatic  trees,  bundles  of  water 
plants,  blue  flowered  and  myriad-leaved,  the 
glowing  shards  of  unknown  fruits  and  nuts- 
all  this  torn  treasure-trove,  brought  on  the  dark 
water,  lured  these  early  adventurers  with  their 
promise  of  rich  reward  to  the  bold.  On  floating 
islands  of  reeds  came  sometimes  huge  pythons, 
or  even  a  fierce  tigre\  swept  down  on  some  such 
frail  raft;  and  these  served  to  keep  alive  the 
stories  of  marvellous  beasts  and  birds  to  be 
found  in  the  pathless  forests. 

And  the  siren  song  of  the  Unknown  did  not 
fall  on  deaf  ears.  Small  bands  of  adventurers 
set  forth,  dazzled  with  dreams  of  gold  and 
of  silver,  and  ever  their  quarry  ran  before 
them.  Some  returned  to  speak  of  the  strange 
things  they  had  seen,  to  tell  of  the  fabled  golden 
cities  of  which  the  Indians  spoke.  Some  never 
returned.  And  men  did  not  know  whether 
these  last  had  died,  miserably,  in  the  forests  : 
or  whether,  perhaps,  they  had  stumbled  by 
chance  on  some  secret  pathway  to  Eldorado 
itself;  and,  like  the  folk  of  ancient  legends,  had 
forgotten  their  long  toil  and  wandering,  the 
voices  of  their  wives  and  children,  the  call  of 
comrades,  in  the  enchanted  atmosphere  of  some 
Golden  Land. 


18  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

The  daylight  dies  fast,  and  the  edges  of  the 
forest  grow  dim  against  the  opal  sky.  The 
river  holds  the  gleam  longest,  till  slowly  the 
moon  comes  up,  and  rests  her  bare  silver  feet  for 
a  moment  on  the  forest  edge,  before  she  slips 
into  the  dark  pool  of  the  sky.  The  hum  of 
insect  life  has  died  down  with  the  day,  and 
from  the  water's  edge  comes  the  chirring  of 
innumerable  frogs.  A  fish  jumps  in  the  dark- 
ness, and  startles  the  quiet  of  the  night. 

Silently  the  white  mists  trail  across  the 
water,  and  wrap  the  tiny  launch  in  shroud  after 
shroud.  They  lay  a  deadening  hand,  too,  upon 
the  river,  and  the  rush  of  the  water  becomes 
flattened  in  tone.  A  rustle  on  the  bank,  caused 
by  some  small  wandering  animal,  breaks  the 
silence  sharply  for  a  moment;  but  it  closes 
down  again.  For  a  time  an  orange  ray  of  light 
shows  from  the  launch,  then  that  too  is  extin- 
guished. Gently  the  boat  swings  to  the  current, 
felt  even  in  the  sheltered  bay. 

The  quiet  hours  of  the  night  go  by  :  till,  with 
a  little  chill  wind,  the  dawn  begins. 

There  is  a  sigh  as  it  reaches  the  tall  reeds 
that  fringe  the  monte",  and  a  drowsy  bird  calls 
in  the  distance.  Little  by  little,  the  line  of 
forest  begins  to  detach  itself  from  the  blur  of 
grey,  a  faint  pulse  of  colour  steals  into  the  sky. 
It  deepens  :  and  a  pale  shaft  of  sunlight  catches 
the  top  of  a  distant  height.  Still  the  river  is 
in  shadow,  but  already  the  smoking  mists  are 


THE    LELIA.  19 

beginning  to  roll  away.       Birds  move  in  the 
thicket,  the  earth  stirs  in  her  sleep. 

It  is  light  enough  now  to  distinguish  the 
sandy  bay,  the  tangle  of  green,  the  jutting 
black  rocks.  The  murmur  of  the  river  seems 
to  become  louder,  and  more  golden  the  fingers 
of  the  sun.  A  flock  of  emerald  par  roquets  fly 
screaming  to  the  further  bank,  and  of  a  sudden, 
the  day  is  here. 


CHAPTER     III. 

THE    DARK    HIGHWAY. 

All  morning  the  shabby  little  motor  launch 
had  chugged  her  way  up  the  river.  A  tropical 
river,  with  a  dense  wall  of  almost  impenetrable 
jungle  on  either  bank,  except  where  some  small 
clearing  had  laboriously  been  made,  or  a  shoot 
for  timber  made  a  brown  scar  in  the  green 
tangle.  Mile  after  mile  it  had  pursued  its 
way,  dodging  from  side  to  side  to  avoid  the 
rapids  or  the  sinister  eddy  of  a  whirlpool.  The 
water  was  agate  coloured,  foaming  to  furious 
amber  round  the  black  rocks  that  pricked  its 
surface.  Scuds  of  yellow  foam  raced  past,  and 
a  few  shining  logs  of  wood.  No  other  boats 
were  to  be  seen,  only  an  occasional  raft  of  timber 
with  a  few  brown  skinned  men  sheltering  from 
the  sun  under  a  flimsy  makeshift  awning.  They 
waved  a  greeting  as  they  whirled  past,  but  their 
thin  voices  were  swept  away  in  the  roar  of  the 
river  and  they  passed  like  ghosts. 

More  and  more  the  solitude  of  the  forest 
seemed  to  press  on  the  mind.  Civilisation 
became  faint  and  far  away.  It  was  difficult 


THE    DARK    HIGHWAY. 


21 


even  to  recall  the  crowded  bustle  of  a  London 
terminus,  the  stir  of  Southampton,  the  arrival 
and  departures  at  various  ports  of  call — all  the 
long  chain  of  movement  and  action  that  had 

ended  here.  The 
dark  green  jungle 
stretched  for 
miles  on  either 
bank,  only  broken 
here  and  there  by 
the  brilliant  flame 
of  some  flowering 


tree.  Men  had 
penetrated  but  a 
little  way  into  the 
interior;  had  only 
brushed,  as  it 
were,  the  fringe 
of  the  unknown. 
Beyond  that  lay 
an  impenetrable  and  secret  land. 

Palms  and  feathery  bamboos  and  huge  forest 
trees  were  caught  and  tangled  in  a  smother  of 
undergrowth,  and  of  lianas  that  hung  in 
festoons,  or  roped  themselves  in  huge  folds 
round  the  trunks.  A  man  who  sought  to  make 
a  path  for  himself  must  hew  and  slash  his  way 
with  a  long  knife.  The  forest  was  very  silent 
except  for  the  muted  call  of  some  hidden  bird, 
or  the  rustling  fall  of  a  seed  pod  from  the  trees. 
Small  birds  flew  in  the  tree  tops,  but  it  was 


22  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

difficult  to  catch  their  tiny  twitterings.  The 
white  sand  of  an  occasional  bay  carried  prints 
of  tapir,  wild  cat,  deer,  pig  and  jaguar.  The 
fastnesses  of  the  jungle  must  have  been  full  of 
eyes  that  watched,  and  of  lithe  bodies  that 
crept  stealthily  amongst  the  undergrowth;  but 
not  a  leaf  stirred  to  show  their  whereabouts. 
Graceful  fork-tailed  hawks,  black  and  white, 
wheeled  and  turned.  Sometimes  a  flock  of 
green  parrots,  with  their  curious  wavering 
flight,  flew  screaming  from  bank  to  bank,  or  a 
couple  of  toucans  with  huge  red-gold  beaks 
showed  for  a  moment  in  a  tree. 

Brilliant  patches  of  orange  and  gold  on  the 
edge  of  the  water  rose  fluttering  as  the  launch 
neared  them,  and  proved  to  be  swarms  of  large 
butterflies,  bright  yellow  above  and  pale  green 
or  lemon-coloured  underneath.  Amongst  them 
a  few  coloured  nasturtium-red,  or  orange  as  a 
tiger  lily.  In  the  clearings  there  were 
glimpses  of  giant  peacock-blue  ones,  spreading 
their  painted  wings  on  some  orchid  or  flowering 
tree.  These  clearings  were  few  and  far 
between,  made  for  the  growing  of  yerba,  with 
a  rough  shed  or  two,  and  a  wooden  slide  for  the 
loading  of  the  bags,  perhaps  a  few  orange  trees 
and  a  patch  of  plantains. 

A  figure  ran  out  sometimes  to  watch  with 
shaded  eyes  the  passing  of  the  launch,  wonder- 
ing whence  it  came  and  whither  it  was  bound  : 
and  all  round  the  clearing  the  monte*  pressed 


THE     DARK     HIGHWAY.  23 

hungrily.  If  man  slackens  his  labour  for  a 
moment,  the  green  tide  of  the  jungle  swallows 
his  work  in  the  twinkling  of  an  eye.  It  is  as 
relentless  and  intractable  as  the  sea. 

The  boatmen,  down-country  men,  spoke  of  the 
river  land  with  awe.  It  is  a  land  of  mystery, 
they  said.  Strange  doings  happen  :  men  once 
persuaded  to  go  there  for  work  find  it  impossible 
to  escape.  The  dark  river  with  its  swift  and 
treacherous  current  turns  jailer,  and  the  silent 
forest  sentinel.  Human  life  is  cheap — and  the 
dividends  of  the  companies  are  large. 

We  listened,  half  incredulous,  half  impressed 
by  their  earnestness.  Some  such  rumours  had 
reached  us  already,  before  setting  forth.  The 
launch  had  been  many  days  on  the  river  and  was 
at  least  two  hundred  miles  from  the  nearest 
town.  Two  hundred  miles  from  civilisation 
and  the  restraining  influence  of  public  opinion. 
Nature  had  become  savage  and  ruthless.  Men 
might  well  have  become  so  too. 

The  sun  blazed  down  upon  the  river,  upon 
the  black  shining  rocks  that  edged  it,  basking 
places  for  numerous  crocodiles,  and  upon  the 
plumed  edge  of  the  monte",  that  shimmered 
and  wavered  in  the  heat.  Against  the  sky 
a  few  dark  specks  wheeled  in  circles,  or 
hung  motionless.  Vultures  that  watched  for 
prey. 

Ahead  of  the  boat,  the  shining  loops  of  the 
river  unwound  themselves  between  the  wide 


24  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

green  walls.  With  startling  suddenness, 
rounding  one  of  these  loops,  the  launch  came  on 
a  strange  scene.  A  group  of  huts  and  a  small 
landing  stage  stood  in  a  clearing,  backed  by  the 
jungle.  And  close  to  the  landing  stage  was  a 
knot  of  people,  unconcernedly  watching  the 
stripping  of  a  dead  man.  He  lay  on  his  back, 
with  bent  knees,  his  dank  hair  making  a  black 
patch  in  the  brilliant  sunlight,  his  naked  limbs 
a  yellowish  colour  like  old  wax.  Two  of  the 
men  were  engaged  in  pulling  a  stained  pink 
vest  over  his  head,  but  they  stopped  their  work 
to  watch  us  pass,  and  the  body  at  their  feet  fell 
back  in  a  huddle.  An  official,  in  some  sort  of 
uniform,  lounged  idly  by,  and  a  woman  and 
child  coming  down  the  path  hardly  stopped  to 
look  at  the  dead  man.  The  launch  was  a  rarer 
and  more  interesting  sight,  and  the  whole  group 
turned  to  stare.  The  captain  shouted  to  ask  if 
medical  help  was  needed,  but  the  indifferent 
answer  came  back,  '  Es  muerto  ya '  (He  is 
already  dead). 

The  Lelia  passed  on  her  way,  and  soon  a  turn 
of  the  river  swallowed  up  the  group,  still 
staring  in  the  sunlight,  with  the  tumbled  heap 
at  their  feet. 

'Yes,  he  is  doubtless  another,'  said  Pedroso, 
the  boatman,  as  he  busied  himself  with  his 
work.  'He  is  one  of  those  of  whom  I  have 
told  you,  Senor,'  and  he  went  on  talking  as 
we  sat  in  the  bows,  watching  the  green  banks 


THE    DAEK    HIGHWAY.  25 

slide  past. 

He  told  us  of  how  men  found  themselves 
prisoners  up  the  river.  Lured  there  by  the 
promise  of  high  wages,  they  soon  found  them- 
selves entangled  in  a  web  of  debt.  Goods  were 

supplied  by  the 
companies,  in  the 
companies' 
stores  :  wages 
were  paid  in  metal 
tokens  that  were 
useless  elsewhere. 
And  how  could 
a  man  escape  ? 
Were  he  to  find 
his  way  through 
the  pathless 
jungle  to  the 
edge  of  the  river, 
jvhat  hope  was 
there  of  finding  a 

boat?  Some,  more  desperate  perhaps  than 
others,  tried  to  swim  across  the  river — but  it 
was  desperation  indeed  that  would  brave  its 
dangers.  And  yet  the  attempt  had  been  made 
again  and  again. 

A  few  years  ago  the  weekly  river  steamer  so 
often  met  floating  corpses  coming  down  stream 
that  it  proved  upsetting  to  the  comfort  of  the 
passengers.  Then  police  had  been  sent  up  to 
*  enquire  into  things ' — but  the  police  had  been 


26  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

conveniently  blind.  True,  there  were  not  so 
many  drowned  bodies  now-a-days.  A  revolver 
shot  in  the  depth  of  the  jungle  was  a  quieter 
way  of  getting  rid  of  a  troublesome  man, 
perhaps.  'And  there  are  always  the  vultures/ 
finished  Pedroso,  as  he  went  aft. 

The  sinister  picture  we  had  seen  remained 
etched  in  our  memories.  Was  it  the  last  scene 
of  some  such  tragedy  as  the  boatman  had  spoken 
of?  We  pictured  the  hopelessness  of  a  man 
finding  himself  prisoned  in  this  distant  land, 
shut  in  by  the  impenetrable  jungle,  watched  by 
armed  guards.  Where  could  he  go  for  help  ? 
Whither  could  he  fly?  The  river  might  be 
several  days'  journey  away,  the  way  unknown. 
And  so,  perhaps,  he  waited  till  anything 
seemed  better  than  inaction.  He  chose  to  brave 
the  dangers  of  the  jungle,  fighting  his  way 
desperately  to  the  river. 

And  then  ? 

His  hope  had  proved  his  destruction.  Either 
he  had  tried  to  swim  across,  or  perhaps  had 
made  some  sort  of  raft  on  which  to  escape.  And 
it  had  ended  as  we  had  seen 

More  than  ever  there  seemed  to  us  something 
terrible  and  pitiless  about  the  river,  about  the 
secret  jungle  and  the  enamelled  brilliance  of  the 
sky.  What  scenes  they  must  have  watched, 
what  tragedies  they  must  have  known ! 

A  few  hours  later  came  the  sudden  dark,  the 
rising  of  mists  along  the  water,  and  the  chirr- 


THE    DARK    HIGHWAY.  27 

ing  of  countless  frogs.  The  restless  beat  of  the 
engines  had  stopped,  and  the  only  sound  was 
the  gentle  tapping  of  the  water  against  the 
bows,  and  the  shiver  of  the  launch  sometimes, 
as  she  knocked  against  the  bank  to  which  she 
was  moored. 

A  little  wandering  wind  brought  the 
fragrance  of  some  night  flower  across  the  river 
— faint  and  exotic.  The  jungle  turned  soft 
grey  and  then  a  velvety  black,  and  from  out  the 
shadows  came  the  sudden  banshee  cry  of  the 
'wailing  bird'  that  stirs  the  heart  with  terror. 
Four  times  repeated,  its  falling  desolate 
cadences  tore  the  quiet  of  the  night,  then  died 
away  to  silence. 


CHAPTER    IV. 

THE  FALLS  OF  IGUAZU. 

Where   the   river   of   this   name   ioins   the 

t> 

Parana  lies  a  small  settlement,  and  turning  to 
the  right  we  entered  the  Iguazii,  and  steamed 
past  the  stone  pillar  on  the  hill  which  marks 
the  boundary  between  the  Argentine  and  Brazil. 

A  few  scattered  buildings  lay  on  the  slope, 
and  an  official  or  two  in  white  uniforms  watched 
our  arrival,  as  we  lay  rocking  gently  on  the 
green  water,  clearer  and  not  so  turbid  as  that 
of  the  Parana. 

Having  secured  our  permits  to  enter  Brazil, 
we  steamed  away  again  back  to  the  larger  river, 
and  went  a  short  way  up  stream.  We  meant  to 
see  the  Falls  from  Brazilian  territory.  The 
Falls,  it  should  be  said,  are  on  the  Iguazii  River 
itself,  some  twenty  miles  up  from  its  junction 
with  the  Parana. 

It  was  very  hot,  and  the  little  bay  with  its 
spit  of  white  sand  lay  scorching  in  the  sun. 
Some  boys  on  a  small  tug  fished  languidly,  and 
the  water  glittered  like  splintered  glass.  We 
hung  mosquito  curtains  across  the  open  doors 


THE    FALLS    OF    IGUAZU.  29 

and  windows  to  keep  out  the  sand  flies,  and  it 
was  a  relief  when  the  sun  sank  lower  and  lower, 
showed  a  flaming  rim  over  the  edge  of  the 
world,  and  then  disappeared.  A  sigh  of 
thankfulness  seemed  to  run  through  the  air,  and 
with  the  sun  disappeared  the  mosquitos  and 
sand  flies. 

We  were  to  start  next  morning  early  for  the 
Falls,  and  a  dilapidated  car  appeared  to  take 
us.  The  road  was  sandy,  and  very  red  in 
colour,  and  the  small  township  stood  amongst 
orange  trees  covered  with  fruit.  A  sackful 
could  be  bought  for  the  equivalent  of  a  shilling, 
fresh  picked  from  the  trees.  There  were  only 
a  handful  of  houses  on  the  hill,  cattle  were 
sheltering  from  the  sun  in  the  open  Assembly 
Hall,  and  the  whole  place  seemed  asleep. 

Our  road  lay  away  from  the  settlement,  and 
we  passed  a  few  scattered  plantations  and 
gardens  before  we  reached  the  forest.  Little 
by  little  we  penetrated  into  its  silence.  Palms 
grew  here  and  there,  and  tall  trees  to  whose 
stems  clung  orchids  pouring  forth  their 
cascades  of  white  or  golden  flowers.  Butterflies 
passed  and  repassed.  The  air  was  heavy  with 
fragrance,  and  on  both  sides  of  the  road  tree- 
ferns  spread  their  feathery  fronds  to  the  sun. 

It  became  an  avenue  of  tree-ferns,  with  their 
red-brown  mossy  boles,  from  which  the  delicate 
greenery  sprang.  Some  were  a  few  feet  high, 
others  towered  eighteen  feet  or  more,  making 


30  THE    GOLDEN     RIVER. 

a  fairy  tracery  on  either  side  of  the  track.  A 
tiny  scarlet  flycatcher  flew  across  the  shadowy 
background,  like  a  blown  poppy-petal,  and  we 
sped  silently  through  an  enchanted  forest, 
while  the  wheels  of  the  car  fell  softly  on  the 
rose- red  earth. 

The  sky  was  blue,  with  sailing  silvery  clouds. 
It  had  been  new  washed  with  a  shower  of  rain, 
and  the  air  was  crystal  clear.  The  forest  was 
not  so  dense  as  those  we  had  seen  before,  and 
we  could  catch  glimpses  now  and  again  of  a 
vista  roofed  with  the  green  spray  of  tree-ferns. 
These  were  easy  to  cut  through,  and  we  cut 
down  one  and  tried  to  carry  it  on  the  car,  with 
its  stem  along  the  body  of  the  motor  and  its 
nodding  green  head  beyond.  But  the  hot  air 
quickly  faded  it.  Butterflies  were  everywhere, 
but  few  birds.  The  forest  thinned,  and  we  saw 
open  space  beyond,  and  running  down  a  narrow 
track  we  came  right  on  the  Falls. 

From  where  we  stood  we  saw  a  curved  stretch 
of  waterfalls,  all  leaping  from  the  same  height, 
and  so  accurately  placed  that  their  loveliness 
was  almost  artificial.  Wooded  slopes  came 
down  to  the  edge  of  the  water,  and  through  the 
silver-dusted  spray  we  saw  the  soft  outlines  of 
forests  stretching  away  into  the  distance.  It 
was  a  sight  to  catch  the  breath.  The  highest  of 
the  Falls,  I  believe,  out-tops  Niagara,  and  the 
chain  of  them  we  saw  from  this  little  bluff  was 
only  part  of  the  whole.  A  wooden  hotel,  half 


A    CURVED    STRETCH    OF    WATERFALLS. 


(To  face  p.  30.) 


THE    FALLS    OF    IGUAZU.  31 

finished,  and  a  rough  guest-house,  were  the  only 
buildings  on  the  Brazilian  side.  There  seemed 
to  be  hardly  a  soul  about.  The  day  was  over- 
cast, with  a  gleam  of  sunshine  now  and  again 
that  set  rainbows  dancing  in  the  spray. 

We  were  told  the  river  was  too  much  in  flood 
to  get  the  best  effect  of  the  Falls,  but  they  can 
never  look  more  beautiful  than  they  did  then. 
The  owner  of  the  guest-house  took  us  along  a 
forest  track  to  show  us  the  different  points  of 
view.  Palms  nodded  above  the  undergrowth, 
great  crimson  and  dark  splotched  leaves, 
vaguely  reminiscent  of  greenhouses  at  home, 
spread  their  broad  fans  to  the  air,  bamboos  and 
bushes  of  all  sorts  filled  up  the  gaps,  and  a  little 
orange-flowered  creeper  wove  its  nets  about 
their  feet. 

We  scrambled  down  the  side  of  the  cliff  by  a 
zigzag  path,  edged  with  pale  pink  begonias, 
and  came  out  on  a  tiny  platform  that  jutted  out 
close  to  one  of  the  Falls.  The  water  glided  over 
an  edge  of  black  rock  in  a  column  of  tangled 
foam.  From  the  pool  below,  the  spray  rose  in 
such  clouds  that  it  was  impossible  to  say  where 
one  ended  and  the  other  began.  Looking  across 
this  part  of  the  river,  we  saw  a  wooded  island 
in  the  midst  of  the  group  of  Falls.  The  river, 
a  little  way  beyond  it,  suddenly  reaches  the 
drop,  and  is  combed  into  a  multitude  of 
cataracts.  Wherever  we  looked  we  saw  them. 

The  cascade  by  which  we  stood  fell  in  a  swift 


32  TH1-:     GOLDKN     KIVKR. 

sheet  over  the  lip  of  the  cliff,  leaving  a  shadowy 
space  behind  the  water.  A  rock  pigeon  flew  out 
from  here  and  darted  back  again,  unperturbed 
by  the  roar  of  the  water.  A  yellow  butterfly 
fluttered  across  through  the  spray  to  the  further 
side,  and  took  no  harm.  Countless  ferns 
clustered  round  the  edge,  and  a  red  lily  grew 
in  the  crevice  of  the  rock,  holding  its  wet  face 
to  the  warm  mist. 

Everything  was  lush  and  scented  and  green. 
We  made  our  way  to  another  point  of  view, 
slipping  and  sliding  on  the  red  soil,  catching  at 
maidenhair  fern  and  flowers  to  keep  our 
balance.  It  was  difficult  to  imagine  anything 
more  beautiful  than  the  feathery  loveliness  of 
these  waterfalls,  set  in  their  background  of 
tropical  forest. 

At  Guayra  we  were  stunned  by  the  savage 
strength  of  water  :  here  we  were  entranced  by 
its  delicate  beauty.  Below  us  the  columns  of 
water  fell  in  smooth  sheets  of  white  and  pale 
amber,  and  through  the  gold  and  green  of  the 
trees  we  could  see  the  distant  silver  gleam  of 
further  Falls.  The  air  was  tremulous  with  the 
sound  of  them,  and,  except  for  that  sound,  the 
woods  were  very  still.  They  seemed  almost,  in 
their  unfamiliar  beauty,  a  painted  scene. 

It  was  the  magic  forest  of  fairy  tales. 
Stepping  softly  under  the  tree-ferns,  and 
through  the  waist-high  tangle  of  vegetation, 
might  one  not  part  the  wide  leaves  and  come 


THE     FALLS    OF     IGUAZU.  33 

suddenly  upon  a  Sleeping  Princess  and  her 
sleeping  court,  guarded  by  yellow  butterflies, 
and  strewn  with  fallen  petals,  doomed  through 
some  spell  to  slumber  in  the  depths  of  the  forest, 
till  the  water  should  cease  to  flow  over  the  Falls 
of  Iguazii?  In  this  strange  and  lovely  wood 
anything  seemed  possible. 


CHAPTER    V. 

AN  INDIAN  HUNTER. 

The  shooting  on  the  Parana  was  more  than 
disappointing.  There  was  none.  The  jungle 
was  so  thick  that  no  game  could  be  seen;  and 
indeed  the  snorting  of  our  little  launch  must 
have  sent  any  game  flying  before  us,  in  the  same 
way  that  it  sent  the  basking  crocodiles  along 
the  bank,  into  the  water  in  a  flash.  All  that 
was  left  to  us  was  to  examine  the  spoor  of  wild 
animals  on  the  sand  of  the  few  small  bays,  and 
to  get  what  thrill  we  could  out  of  the  fact  that 
deer,  tapir,  pig,  wild  cat,  and  ant-eaters 
abounded.  At  the  Brazilian  headquarters, 
near  the  mouth  of  the  Iguazu,  we  sent  for  an 
Indian  hunter. 

He  arrived  with  his  lurcher  dog  :  a  lean,  small 
man,  very  dark,  and  with  quick  roving  eyes. 
He  was  like  a  small  wild  animal  himself.  He 
told  us  of  the  long  weeks  he  spent  in  the  forest, 
tracking  game ;  carrying  a  little  yerba  with  him, 
and  living  on  what  he  shot.  He  spoke  of  the 
tigre*  (the  South  American  jaguar)  that  men 
hunted  down  like  vermin  and  poisoned. 


AN     INDIAN     HUNTER. 


35 


We  had  become  rather  sceptical  about  tigre*. 
At  every  place  we  were  told  of  their  exploits, 


and  now,  at  Iguazu,  they  told  stories  of  one, 
which,  when  hunted  on  the  Brazilian  side, 
forthwith  swam  the  Parana  into  Paraguay. 
When  worried  in  the  latter  country,  he  swam 
back  to  Brazil.  This  international  tigre*  was 
still  alive  :  he  deserved  to  be. 

The  little  hunter  knew  all  the  places  on  the 
river  where  the  wild  animals  came  down  to 
drink,  and  it  was  his  suggestion  that  we  should 


36  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

tie  up  at  such  a  place,  on  the  chance  of  sport. 
He  came  on  board  late  one  evening,  and  stood 
talking  in  the  lamplight,  fingering  his  soft  hat, 
his  shock  of  dark  hair  falling  across  his  fore- 
head, and  the  light  catching  on  his  sharp  cheek- 
bones and  grooving  deep  lines  on  his  brown  face. 

He  was  a  free  man,  he  said,  not  like  some. 
He  worked  for  a  master  who  treated  him  fairly, 
he  was  not  beaten,  and  he  got  his  wages 
regularly.  His  work  took  him  into  the  forest 
for  weeks  at  a  time,  and  it  was  plain  to  see  that 
he  was  not  happy  with  a  roof  over  his  head, 
though  he  held  himself  with  dignity. 

At  dawn,  a  small  expedition  set  out,  looking 
ghost-like  in  the  curling  mists,  making  its  way 
through  the  wall  of  reeds  that  came  more  than 
shoulder  high  :  but  it  had  no  luck,  and  came 
back  hungry  and  disappointed.  And  the  only 
tigre  we  ever  saw  was  a  magnificent  one  in  the 
zoo  at  Montevideo. 

The  lives  of  these  lonely  hunters  and  woods- 
men must  be  strange  ones,  working  as  they  do 
in  the  forests,  dependent  on  their  own  resource 
and  courage  for  life  itself,  finding  their  way 
almost  by  an  animal's  instinct;  more  akin  them- 
selves to  the  wild  creatures  of  the  jungle  than 
to  other  men. 

We  had  come  across  another  forest  dweller 
in  our  travels,  but  a  very  different  one,  when 
we  tied  up  one  night  in  a  little  bay,  close  to 
which  a  woodcutter's  clearing  stretched  lik^  a 


AN     INDIAN     HUNTER.  3T 

brown  streak  through  the  green.  A  few  huts 
stood  on  a  little  knoll,  rough  shelters  with  a 
palm  leaf  thatch  :  and  some  brown  children 
played  about,  whilst  a  thin  spiral  of  blue  smoke 
rose  unwavering  on  the  still  air.  We  passed 
the  huts  as  we  went  for  an  evening  stroll  up  the 
clearing,  and  a  pretty  native  girl  smiled  up  at 
us  as  she  bent  over  a  cooking  pot  on  the  open 
fire. 

We  had  seen  the  figure  of  a  man,  evidently 
in  charge  of  the  woodcutters,  watching  our 
arrival,  and  something  in  his  upright  carriage 
and  easy  air  had  aroused  our  curiosity.  As  we 
got  back  to  the  little  launch,  which  lay  silently 
on  the  dark  water  of  the  bay,  her  restless  heart- 
beat stilled  for  the  night,  he  moved  nearer.  The 
one  member  of  our  party  who  could  speak 
Spanish  fluently,  an  Irishman  who  had  been  in 
Uruguay  since  he  was  a  boy,  overheard  him  say  : 
'  Look  at  those  foreign  greenhorns  :  I  shall  go 
and  make  fools  of  them. ' '  On  that  he  sauntered 
down  the  sandy  slope  to  greet  us,  his  hands  in 
his  pockets,  his  slouch  hat  well  on  one  side.  He 
was  dressed  poorly,  in  dungaree  trousers  and  a 
loose  shirt  open  at  the  throat,  and  was  a  grizzled 
man  of  about  sixty. 

The  conversation  began,  and  we  were  amused 
to  see  interest  and  friendliness  creep  into  his 
face,  and  soon  he  and  the  Irishman  were  deep 
in  talk.  He  spoke  in  an  educated  voice,  and  it 
was  strange  to  hear  it  in  this  corner  of  the 


38  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

forest,  to  the  undertone  of  the  hurrying  river, 
and  with  the  huddle  of  poor  huts  behind  him. 
He  asked  what  we  were  doing,  and  what  our 
plans  were,  and  feared  we  should  find  it  difficult 
to  find  game.  He  saw  plenty,  but  then  it  was 
his  job  to  go  into  the  depths  of  the  forest,  mark- 
ing good  timber  in  the  unexplored  monte",  a  gang 
of  woodsmen  under  him.  He  got  paid  so  much 
for  every  square  foot  of  wood  sent  down  the 
river  by  raft.  He  had  not  always  lived  this 
life,  he  had  been  a  colonel  in  the  Uruguayan 
army,  amongst  other  things. 

At  that,  our  friend  interrupted  that  he  knew 
Uruguay  well,  and  the  two  fell  to  discussing 
various  mutual  acquaintances  with  great 
delight.  The  last  traces  of  suspicion  and 
reserve  cleared  away  from  the  other's  face,  his 
features  lit  up  with  a  smile,  and  his  dark  eyes 
under  their  grey  penthouse  were  keen  and  alive. 
'And  you  came  by  Buenos  Aires,  sefior?  '  he 
asked.  'When  I  have  made  money,  I,  too,  go 
to  Buenos  Aires.'  'Alone,'  he  added,  with  a 
gesture  of  his  hand  that  swept  the  little  group 
round  the  huts  into  insignificance. 

He  told  us  he  had  married  an  Indian  girl  and 
had  thirty- three  children.  My  Spanish  was  not 
good  enough  to  catch  if  '  The  Indian  girl '  was 
in  the  singular  or  plural.  In  any  case,  he  did 
not  appear  to  be  weighed  down  with  the 
responsibilities  of  paternity.  He  explained 
that  he  worked  for  months  in  the  forest,  then 


AN    INDIAN    HUNTER.  39 

slipped  away  to  Buenos  Aires  and  spent  his 
earnings.  When  they  were  all  gone,  he  came 
back  and  plunged  once  more  into  the  silence  of 
the  wilderness.  No,  he  did  not  want  anything, 
unless,  perhaps,  we  had  good  tobacco  to  spare  ? 
In  a  flash  the  Irishman  was  into  the  launch, 
there  were  sounds  of  a  hasty  turning  over  of 
things,  and  back  he  came  with  a  tin  of  tobacco. 
Then  the  two  shook  hands,  and  the  woodsman 
turned  away  up  the  sandy  slope  that  glimmered 
whitely  in  the  fading  light,  and  the  parting  call 
of  '  hasta  luego '  came  musically  back  to  us  out 
of  the  dusk. 

Early  next  morning  we  were  astir,  and  soon 
after  dawn  the  sound  of  our  engines  awoke  the 
sleepy  birds.  As  we  turned  the  corner  of  the 
bay  and  slid  into  the  racing  current  of  the  river, 
we  looked  back,  and  saw  his  tall  figure  standing 
motionless  on  the  shore  to  watch  our  departure, 
whilst  the  brown  children  waved  to  us  from  the 
tiny  huts  that  were  already  scarcely  distinguish- 
able in  the  dense  vegetation. 


CHAPTER    VI. 

THE  FIRST  DAY'S  FISHING. 

Now  began  our  first  day's  fishing,  and  our 
fisherman  shall  tell  it  in  his  own  words. 

It  was  ten  o'clock  when  we  left  the  launch, 
Pedroso  and  I,  and  dropped  downstream  to  fish 
for  dorado.  The  little  puerto  where  the  launch 
was  moored  slept  in  the  still  heat.  It  was  no 
more  than  a  landing  place,  from  which  a  track, 
orange  red,  made  a  slanting  line  up  the  steep 
cliff,  and  at  the  top  was  a  small  clearing  with 
one  or  two  houses.  All  round,  and  on  both  sides 
of  the  river,  the  tropical  forest  fell  like  a 
curtain.  Tall  trees,  different  tones  of  a  sombre 
green,  and  delicate  bamboos  like  immense 
feathery  asparagus,  were  roped  together  by 
lianas,  making  impenetrable  walls  through 
which  no  man  could  walk  a  yard  without  cutting 
his  way.  Between  them  ran  the  river,  five 
hundred  yards  wide,  deep  and  turbulent,  a  long 
way  still  above  its  summer  level,  coloured  with 
a  mixture  of  amber  and  jade,  but  clear  and 
translucent. 

A  few  hours  earlier,  as  we  were  steaming 


THE    FIRST    DAY'S    FISHING.  41 

laboriously  up,  my  companion,  leaning  over  the 
side,  had  pointed  and  said,  '  That  looks  a  good 
stream,  you  had  better  try  there.'  I  looked. 
The  current,  swinging  across  from  the  Para- 
guay bank,  met,  on  the  Brazil  shore,  a  long  reef 
of  submerged  rock,  which  deflected  and  com- 
pressed it.  The  result  was  a  stretch  of  tumbled 
water,  shallow  where  it  ran  over  the  reef,  deep 
and  swirling  beyond,  with  a  broad  quiet  back- 
water between  it  and  the  Brazilian  bank.  I 
looked  carefully.  I  knew  next  to  nothing  of 
dorado  fishing,  but  had  been  told  that  they  lived 
in  strong  rapid  water.  The  experiment  had  to 
be  made  somewhere  :  why  not  make  it  there  ? 

As  we  dropped  down  to  it,  carried  more  by 
the  sweeping  current  than  by  the  occasional 
touches  of  Pedroso's  paddle,  I  tried  a  cast  or 
two  before  arriving  :  not  that  I  expected  to 
catch  anything;  but  the  rod  was  new,  and  so 
was  the  Silex  reel,  and  it  was  as  well  to  learn 
their  kick  before  reaching  the  fish.  We  were 
not  long  doing  so.  Pedroso  with  a  few  strokes 
of  his  paddle  shot  the  canoe  into  the  easy  water, 
and  I  made  a  short  cast.  I  had  not  the  slightest 
idea  what  to  expect.  I  had  never  seen  a  dorado. 
Whether  there  were  any  there  or  not,  whether 
they  would  take  and  how,  and  when  :  all  this 
was  hidden.  Pedroso  was  hardly  less  ignorant, 
and  such  experience  as  he  possessed  was  con- 
fined to  hand-lining  with  a  blindcord  and  a 
chunk  of  fish.  In  this  state  of  glorious 


42  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

uncertainty    I    made    a    first    cast    into    the 
unknown. 

I  was  not  kept  long  in  doubt.  The  spoon  was 
swinging  round  with  the  stream  when  the  rod 
point  was  dragged  down  by  something  heavy 
and  invisible,  which  tore  a  few  yards  off  the 
reel,  and  then  kicked  itself  off.  Next  cast  I 
was  into  another  at  once,  and  the  first  dorado 
I  had  ever  seen  leapt  into  the  air,  short  and 
thick,  glowing  with  a  pure  deep  gold,  his  tail 
splashed  with  a  crimson  bar.  There  he  was,  a 
dorado;  a  dorado,  kicking  and  bucking  and 
glittering  in  the  sun  like  molten  metal.  I  am 
certain  we  both  yelled.  Off  he  rushed,  ripping 
fifty  or  sixty  yards  off  the  reel,  jumping  and 
swirling  and  splashing,  more  in  the  air  than  in 
the  water.  It  was  a  moment  of  pure  delight : 
all  doubts  were  at  an  end,  dorado  were  there 
and  I  had  hooked  one.  Then  suddenly  in  one 
of  his  jumps  the  spoon  came  back.  He  had 
broken  the  ring  which  held  the  hook,  a  steel 
ring.  This  was  the  special  wriggly  jump  of 
the  dorado  against  which  I  had  been  warned, 
that  jump  which  has  saved  the  life  of  many  a 
one,  when  he  springs  three  foot  clear,  and 
shakes  his  body  madly  from  head  to  tail, 
smashing  split  rings  like  gingerbread.  Perhaps 
I  had  not  got  my  point  down  in  time  :  very 
likely  not.  But  I  was  too  excited  to  mind  his 
loss  :  and  anyhow,  dorado  were  there,  that  was 
the  great  thing.  So  a  fresh  spoon  was  rigged 


THE     FIRST    DAY'S    FISHING.  43 

up,   and  after  three  casts  a  third  fish  was 
hooked. 

He  was  much  bigger  :  how  big  cannot  be  said 
for  he  was  never  weighed.  If  the  last  was 
between  fifteen  and  twenty  pounds  weight,  as 
it  probably  was,  this  one  was  between  twenty 
and  twenty-five,  perhaps  more.  He  behaved 
like  a  fish  of  his  size.  He  jumped,  but  not  so 
often,  just  enough  to  show  his  length  and  depth, 
and  then  before  I  knew  anything  he  had  a 
hundred  yards  of  line  out  in  the  first  rush, 
and  was  all  over  the  strong  water,  playing 
ferociously.  Downstream  he  went,  then  rushed 
across,  rolling  up  to  the  top,  shaking  his  head 
and  lashing  his  tail.  Suddenly,  in  one  of  his 
runs,  a  fast  one  but  nothing  exceptional,  I  felt 
he  was  off.  I  reeled  in.  He  had  broken  the 
reel  line. 

Here  was  a  tragedy,  deep  and  far-reaching 
Pedroso  paddled  the  boat  into  the  shore  and 
we  sat  down  to  think  it  over.  The  accident 
meant  far  more  than  the  loss  of  the  fish,  though 
that  was  bad  enough.  My  line  was  the  only 
one  I  had.  It  was  new.  It  had  been  bought 
specially  for  dorado.  And  it  had  broken  when 
it  ought  not  to  have  broken.  It  was  broken, 
not  cut.  I  was  holding  the  fish  hard,  no  doubt, 
but  not  unduly  so.  The  rod  was  well  up  and 
reel  running.  The  break  was  not  at  a  knot  or 
loop,  but  fair  in  the  middle  of  the  line,  some 
way  apparently  from  the  trace.  If  it  had 


44  THE    GOLDEN     RIVER. 

failed  once,  it  would  fail  again.     I  tested  it. 
It  could  be  broken  easily  between  the  hands. 

My  thoughts  were  not  pleasant,  as  I  sat  in 
the  hot  sunlight,  whilst  parrots  screamed  over- 
head and  vultures  swung  at  all  distances  in  the 
speckless  sky.  I  was  seven  thousand  miles 
from  England  and  some  thousands  from  the 
nearest  tackle  shop.  The  river  was  falling  by 
feet  every  night  and  rapidly  coming  into  order. 
It  was  the  beginning  of  October,  the  spring  of 
the  southern  hemisphere,  and  the  best  of  the 
fishing  was  just  starting.  Here  was  I,  far  up 
the  Alto- Parana,  between  where  the  Iguazii 
river,  after  cascading  over  falls  of  incompar- 
able beauty,  pours  her  broad  waters  into  the 
broader  and  darker  wave  of  the  Parana;  and 
that  remote  and  savage  spot  where  the  Parana 
herself  is  hurled  and  shattered  through  the  wild 
gorge  of  Guayra.  It  was  a  place  where  few 
fishermen  had  penetrated.  I  had  looked 
forward  to  a  fortnight  of  such  fishing  as  not 
many  have  had  before,  when  the  glory  of  the 
pursuit  of  that  splendid  fish  is  enhanced  by  the 
magic  of  the  tropics,  and  the  mystery  of  the 
unknown.  There  was  the  opportunity  in  my 
hand;  was  it  all  to  be  wasted  because  of  a 
wretched  rotten  line?  I  cursed  myself  for 
coming  out  with  only  one  line.  But  after  all 
who  expects  a  line  to  break  ?  Or,  if  it  breaks, 
who  expects  to  find  it  all  rotten?  This  one 
seemed  weak  all  through.  As  more  and  more 


THE    FIRST    DAY'S    FISHING.  45 

of  it  broke  off,  the  future  seemed  gloomier  and 
gloomier.  At  last,  however,  a  stronger  part 
was  reached.  Something  had  to  be  done,  so  a 
new  trace  and  spoon  were  knotted  on.  Pedroso, 
who  was  lying  back  in  the  canoe  smoking  one  of 
those  terrible  cigars  in  which  he  delighted, 
roused  himself,  and  half  paddled  and  half 
punted  up  the  lake-like  edge  of  the  river  until 
we  got  back  to  the  head  of  the  stream  where  we 
had  begun. 

I  forget  how  many  more  casts  were  made, 
certainly  not  six,  before  another  great  fish  was 
tearing  across  the  river.  He  might  have  been 
brother  to  the  one  who  had  just  broken  the 
line,  except  that  he  jumped  oftener.  The  first 
rush  of  a  big  dorado  is  like  nothing  on  earth. 
Something  will  be  said  later  about  his  fighting 
qualities,  and  how  he  compares  with  the  salmon. 
But  about  the  first  rush  there  can  be  no  doubt. 
He  goes  straight  off  full  pace  at  once.  However 
hard  you  hold  (and  you  have  to  forget  all  your 
salmon  fishing  and  hold  thirty  pound  dorado  as 
though  they  were  half  pound  trout) ,  you  will  be 
lucky  if  you  stop  him  under  one  hundred  yards, 
and  I  once  had  one  hundred  and  eighty  yards 
ripped  off  without  a  pause.  His  first  rush  is 
usually  down ;  but  he  will  suddenly  turn  and  go 
across  and  up,  and  then  perhaps  straight  down 
again.  So  you  have  to  be  hard  and  skilful  if 
you  are  to  avoid  a  bagged  line,  and  a  bagged 
line  is  fatal,  for  there  is  no  river  in  which  the 


46  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

rocks  are  better  adapted  for  hanging  you  up. 
I  say  this  with  bitterness.  My  fish  had  rushed 
like  a  mad  elephant  all  over  the  strong  water; 
but  I  was  just  beginning  to  take  charge  and 
hoped  to  haul  him  into  the  backwater,  when 
suddenly  he  got  me  round  a  submerged  rock. 

There  then  ensued  twenty  minutes  of  experi- 
ence such  as  we  have  in  nightmares.  The  line 
was  fast,  far  over  the  river,  and  above  us.  The 
stream  was  too  strong  to  allow  us  to  paddle  up, 
get  above  and  clear.  Pedroso  tried  heroically, 
tried  till  he  nearly  dropped,  and  I  took  the 
paddle  and  did  no  better.  We  could  just  hang 
on  in  the  stream,  now  making  a  few  yards,  now 
losing  them;  but  get  within  fifty  yards  of  that 
rock  we  could  not.  Oh,  for  a  pair  of  oars  :  even 
a  pair  of  sculls  might  have  done  it,  but  a  paddle 
was  useless.  No  man  could  force  the  boat 
against  that  torrent.  Finally  we  tried  to  go 
inshore  out  of  the  stream,  get  above,  and  then 
put  out  into  the  stream  again.  But  here  too  we 
were  beaten.  There  were  two  hundred  yards  of 
line  on  the  reel.  But  that  was  not  enough  to 
reach  from  the  rock  into  the  still  water.  I  had 
to  break,  and  the  maddening  thing  was  that  the 
fish  was  still  on.  He  was  on  all  the  time.  He 
kept  swirling  up  and  splashing,  rolling  over  on 
his  broad  golden  side,  securely  anchored  forty 
yards  below  where  the  line  pointed.  Some  days 
after,  as  we  came  back  and  the  water  had  fallen 
so  much  that  the  reef  over  which  we  had 


THE     FIRST    DAY'S    FISHING.  47 

struggled  and  sweated  was  dry  land,  Pedroso 
pointed  out  the  exact  spot  where  we  had  been 
caught.  From  the  excitement  with  which  he 
approached  it,  he  clearly  expected  the  fish  to  be 
still  there. 

We  pushed  the  nose  of  the  boat  on  to  the  sand 
and  sat  down  and  smoked.  We  were  tired  and 
disheartened,  and  we  saw  the  launch  coming 
down  to  pick  us  up.  But  Pedroso  signed  to  me 
to  have  one  more  cast.  I  did  so,  with  the 
premonition  of  tragedy  heavy  on  me.  I  cast, 
and  hooked  the  biggest  dorado  of  the  day. 

He  played  differently  from  the  others.  He 
went  off  with  a  heavy  run  and  surged  up  to  the 
top  more  than  once.  But  he  went  neither  as 
fast  nor  as  far  as  the  others,  nor  did  he  jump. 
I  got  him  out  of  the  stream  into  a  swirly  hole, 
very  deep.  There  he  sounded,  sailing  round 
and  round,  hanging  all  his  great  weight  on  the 
line,  head  downwards.  When  pulled  out  of 
the  hole  he  bored  downstream  sullenly,  occa- 
sionally dragging  off  a  few  yards  of  line,  and 
then  letting  himself  be  reeled  in.  So  we  went 
on  for  half  an  hour  down  a  mile  of  water.  I 
had  him  hard  by  the  head  the  whole  time ;  but, 
since  he  had  left  the  stream,  he  had  not  shown 
on  the  top.  Finally  he  gave  one  or  two  of  those 
wobbles  which  every  fisherman  knows  mean  that 
the  end  is  near,  rolled  up  to  the  top,  lashed  his 
tail,  opened  an  immense  mouth,  and — the  spoon 
came  away. 


48  THE     GOLDEN     RIVER. 

Late  that  afternoon,  when  the  sun  had  got 
behind  the  Paraguayan  forest  and  the  swift 
tropic  night  was  near,  I  killed  a  dorado  of 
twenty  pounds  and  a  quarter.  How  heavy  the 
big  one  was,  I  do  not  know.  But  I  do  know 
that  the  twenty  pounder  felt  like  a  trout  com- 
pared to  him.  And,  as  though  the  tragedy  of 
the  day  were  not  complete,  another  fish,  hooked 
just  before  dark,  again  broke  my  cursed  line; 
broke  it  right  in  the  middle  of  the  backing  and 
carried  away  all  that  remained  of  the  reel  line. 
Perhaps  it  was  as  well  that  it  should  go  to  the 
bottom  of  the  Parana.  It  was  rotten  from  end 
to  end  :  and  the  reader,  who  must  be  as  sick  of 
it  as  I  was,  shall  hear  no  more  of  it. 


CHAPTER    VII. 

AT    PUERTO    MENDEZ. 

At  Puerto  Mendez  the  river  had  become 
unnavigable.  It  boiled  in  furious  whirlpools, 
that  caught  the  stern  of  the  little  launch  as  she 
threaded  her  way  amongst  them,  and  shook  her 
as  a  leaf  in  the  wind.  The  wall  of  the  forest 
had  first  given  place  to  banks  of  plumed 
reeds,  and  then  to  higher  ground.  The  river 
narrowed,  and  cleft  its  way  with  sudden  turns 
and  twists  through  a  ravine  which  shut  out  the 
daylight.  At  one  of  them  a  large  tree  hung 
over  the  water,  its  branches  weighed  down  with 
blue  and  red  macaws  feeding  upon  the  fruit, 
and  tearing  off  leaves  and  branches  with  their 
powerful  beaks.  At  the  sound  of  a  shot  they 
rose  screaming,  and  disappeared  heavily  into 
the  green. 

A  few  miles  on  we  reached  the  furthest  point 
to  which  the  launch  could  venture;  and  she 
crept,  panting,  to  a  small  landing  stage  under 
the  shelter  of  the  cliff.  Round  the  next  bend, 
only  ten  days  before,  a  tug,  with  a  raft  in  tow, 
had  gone  down  alive  into  the  whirlpools  with 


E 


50  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

her  crew  of  twelve,  and  had  never  been  seen 
again.  Higher  up  the  river  were  the  great 
Falls  of  Guayra,  which  we  had  journeyed  all 
these  miles  to  see.  So  few  have  seen  them  that 
they  have  almost  achieved  a  legendary  fame. 
To  reach  them  one  must  travel  through  the 
forest,  then  go  by  boat  for  some  hours,  and  then 
again  cross  some  miles  of  monte'.  We  stood  at 
the  water's  edge  and  looked  back  on  the  winding 
way  we  had  come ;  then  above  our  heads,  to  the 
tiny  settlement  of  Puerto  Mendez,  perched  on 
the  edge  of  the  cliff  and  looking  across  to  Para- 
guay. The  Parana  forms  the  boundary  between 
that  country  and  Brazil,  and  sometimes  we 
had  anchored  by  one  bank,  and  sometimes  by 
another. 

A  kind  of  funicular  for  the  loading  of  yerba 
climbed  the  steep  cliff,  and  already  a  small 
platform  was  creeping  down,  like  a  spider  on  a 
thread,  to  fetch  us.  On  to  this,  with  our  scanty 
luggage,  we  climbed;  and  slowly  the  river  fell 
away  below  us,  and  the  launch  dwindled  to  a 
scrap  of  a  thing  out  of  a  toyshop.  It  was  very 
hot.  The  sun  poured  down  upon  us,  and  great 
yellow  butterflies  sailed  past  on  outspread 
wings.  We  were  so  dazzled  by  the  light  that 
when  we  reached  the  shed  at  the  top  we  could 
see  nothing  at  first  in  the  sudden  gloom.  It  was 
a  wooden  shed,  and  was  filled  with  sacks  ready 
to  be  sent  down  the  river.  Men  were  at  work 
unloading  them  from  an  open  truck,  passing 


THE    LELIA. 


THE    I'UXICULAK    AT    PUEItTO    MENDEX. 


(To  face  p. 


AT    PUERTO    MENDEZ.  51 

from  the  glare  outside  the  doorway  into  the 
dusty  shadowed  interior.  Many  of  them  were 
naked  to  the  waist,  and  the  warm  terra  cotta  of 
their  bodies  was  powdered  with  yellowish  dust 
from  the  sacks  of  yerba. 

Crouched  on  the  ground  was  a  little  group  of 
new  arrivals,  a  man  and  woman,  Paraguayans, 
with  two  or  three  children;  a  few  bundles  by 
their  side.  They  waited  patiently  for  orders, 
staring  impassively  at  the  scene  around  them. 
The  woman  had  a  sleeping  child  on  her  lap,  and 
a  ray  of  sunlight  fell  across  its  bare  brown 
limbs  and  the  faded  blue  of  its  frock.  Across 
its  dark  head  she  gazed  quietly  into  space, 
thinking  of  nothing,  it  seemed.  Not  fearful  of 
the  future,  nor  regretting  the  past ;  but  dumbly 
patient,  like  some  gentle  animal. 

From  the  built-out  verandah  of  the  superin- 
tendent's house,  which  hung  like  a  swallow's 
nest  over  the  cliff,  we  looked  down  upon  the 
river  far  below  :  so  far  that  its  roar  could  not 
reach  us.  Between  the  dark  high  banks  it 
gleamed  like  an  eye  through  half -closed  lids. 

It  was  the  middle  of  the  day,  and  the  little 
collection  of  buildings  stood  full  in  the  blinding 
glare  of  the  sun.  The  red  uneven  road  that 
straggled  past  the  sheds  and  yards  forming  the 
station  was  ankle-deep  in  dust.  A  bullock  cart 
or  two  were  drawn  up  at  the  side  of  it,  the 
bullocks  unyoked  and  feeding,  whilst  the  drivers 
lay  in  the  square  of  grateful  shade  made  by  the 


52  THE    GOLDEN     RIVER. 

carts,  sleeping  or  taking  mate.  Far  overhead 
the  vultures  kept  their  tireless  watch,  sailing 
with  motionless  wings  in  widening  spirals.  The 
heat  seemed  to  have  sucked  the  intense  colour 
from  the  sky,  and  even  from  the  brilliant  foliage 
of  the  distant  monte",  now  blurred  to  a  dull 
green.  The  silence  of  mid-day  was  so  deep 
that  one  could  hear  the  tiny  gurgle  of  the  mate* 
in  the  gourds  from  which  the  bullock  drivers 
sucked  it,  or  the  sharp  crack  of  a  corrugated 
iron  roof  in  the  heat.  Straining  the  ears,  the 
distant  murmur  of  the  Parana  was  just  audible, 
from  below  the  cliffs  on  which  the  small  settle- 
ment was  perched.  As  far  as  the  eye  could 
reach,  wooded  spurs  ran  down  to  the  water's 
edge,  and  the  steely  gleam  of  the  river  shone  in 
distant  loops  amongst  the  trees.  The  air  was 
so  still  that  the  vine  trained  on  the  verandah 
seemed  as  if  its  leaves  were  cut  out  of  thin 
metal.  Nothing  moved,  save  where  a  butterfly 
fluttered  languidly  amongst  the  drooping 
flowers. 

The  little  train  that  wound  its  way  into  the 
interior  was  not  to  start  for  another  hour,  and 
it  was  pleasant  to  follow  the  superintendent 
into  the  shade  of  his  cool  house.  He  was 
a  Dane,  and  had  married  a  native  wife;  and 
as  we  stepped  into  the  living  room,  built  out 
on  the  edge  of  the  cliff,  it  seemed  full  of 
people,  who  rose  at  our  entrance.  His  wife  was 
a  dark-skinned  woman,  dressed  in  a  faded  print 


AT  PUERTO   MENDEZ.  53 

wrapper.  She  had  rather  a  sweet  face,  and 
received  us  with  anxious  courtesy.  One  by  one 
the  other  occupants  of  the  room  were  brought 
up  and  introduced,  and  shook  hands.  The 
eldest  daughter  took  after  her  father,  and  was 
a  pretty  refined  girl  about  fifteen,  with  fair 
rippling  hair,  very  blue  eyes,  and  a  pink  and 
white  complexion.  She  was  dressed  in  a  blue 
muslin  frock,  her  hair  in  a  thick  plait  down  her 
back.  There  was  another  girl  of  about  the 
same  age,  who  appeared  to  be  spending  the  day 
with  her  :  a  thin  faced  sallow  slip  of  a  thing, 
just  back  from  a  trip  down  the  river,  with  a 
paste  slide  fastening  her  hair.  The  two  girls 
stood  with  their  arms  round  each  other,  in  an 
affectionate  attitude,  but  one  felt  a  touch  of 
rivalry  between  them.  In  that  hot  climate 
women  mature  early.  Two  young  men  were 
making  themselves  agreeable  to  them  :  one,  a 
flashy  looking  clerk,  or  store-keeper,  with  oiled 
hair  and  a  small  curled  moustache,  dressed  in  a 
linen  suit.  The  other,  a  half-caste,  tall  and 
lithe,  in  riding  breeches  and  a  loose  shirt,  with 
spurs  on  his  long  soft  boots,  a  knife  in  his  broad 
leather  belt,  and  a  silver-handled  whip  dangling 
from  his  wrist.  He  looked  as  if  he  might  be  a 
dangerous  rival,  and  a  black  eye  did  not  add  to 
his  charms;  but  the  other  man  had  the  more 
assurance. 

The  Indian  wife  was  rather  overwhelmed  bv 

V 

our  arrival,  and  as  her  Spanish  vocabulary  was 


54  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

almost  as  limited  as  mine,  conversation  pre- 
sented some  difficulties.  She  brought  up  her 
second  daughter  to  shake  hands  with  us,  a 
plump  brown  tomboy  of  about  seven,  in  a  very 
short  frock,  with  a  tangled  head  of  dark  hair, 
who  stoutly  refused  to  have  anything  to  do  with 
us.  But  she  was  a  useful  addition  to  the  party, 
as  each  member  of  it,  when  anxious  to  air  their 
society  manners,  would  try  to  pull  down  her 
abbreviated  pink  skirt  over  her  dimpled  bare 
legs,  murmuring,  in  Spanish,  injunctions  to 
behave  like  a  lady :  injunctions  which  were 
serenely  disregarded.  A  small  boy,  staring  at 
us  with  his  finger  in  his  mouth,  belonged  to  the 
family  too,  and  there  was  a  sleeping  baby,  of 
indeterminate  sex,  in  a  cradle  in  a  corner  of  the 
room.  Various  people  drifted  in  to  gaze  at  us, 
and  drifted  aimlessly  out  again.  The  young 
store-keeper,  with  the  air  of  a  man  of  the 
world,  spoke  of  the  difficulties  of  travel,  and 
enquired  if  we  found  Buenos  Aires  larger  than 
London,  whilst  he  flicked  a  speck  of  dust  off  his 
narrow  patent  leather  shoes.  The  fair-haired 
girl  was  obviously  impressed  by  his  aplomb,  and 
I  caught  an  admiring  expression  in  her  blue 
eyes.  He  caught  it  too,  and  twirled  his 
moustache  complacently.  '  It  must  be  interest- 
ing to  see  the  world,'  she  murmured,  her  eyes 
on  the  ground,  and  was  a  little  vexed  when  her 
mother  remarked  that  they  had  meant  her  to  go 
to  Posadas  to  be  educated,  but  that  she  refused 


AT    PUERTO    MENDEZ. 


55 


to  leave  home.  They  had  another  daughter  at 
school  there,  and  it  was  wonderful  how  clever 
she  was  becoming,  and  how  elegant,  and  what 
a  lady !  Here  the  sallow  girl  mentioned  that 
she  too  had  seen  Posadas,  a  beautiful  town,  and 
full  of  wonderful  shops.  The  half-caste 
remarked  casually  that  he  believed  it  was  neces- 
sary to  carry  a  revolver  in  those  places,  though 
the  down-country  men  were  poor  shots. 

Most  of  the  people  in  the  room  having  thus 
asserted  their  superiority,   there  fell  a  little 

silence.  We  had  en- 
quired the  name  and 
age  of  the  baby,  of  the 
little  boy,  and  of  the 
tomboy,  and  still  there 
were  no  signs  of  any 
train.  My  mind  was 
desperately  framing 
Spanish  sentences  to 
fling  into  the  void. 
The  native  woman's 

eyes  were  fixed  on  me,  and  I  knew  she  was 
making  a  careful  inventory  of  my  clothes.  Then 
her  eyes  fell  on  a  crystal  charm  I  was  wearing, 
hung  on  a  black  ribbon,  and  she  asked  what  it 
was.  Here  indeed  was  a  heaven-sent  topic. 
I  explained  it  came  from  India.  'India?' 
they  echoed  vaguely,  whilst  the  young  store- 
keeper remarked  importantly  that  he  had  read 
of  that  country.  I  explained  that  some  people 


56  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

said  it  was  a  magic  stone,  and  that  they  could 
see  pictures  of  the  future  in  it.  This  caused 
great  excitement,  and  the  whole  group  drew 
nearer,  and  even  the  tomboy  ceased  to  wave  her 
brown  legs  in  the  air.  I  asked  if  anyone  would 
like  to  look  at  it,  and  handed  it  to  our  hostess, 
who  took  it  as  one  might  a  snake  of  doubtful 
family.  I  explained  it  was  best  to  put  it  on 
some  dark  material,  and  the  fair  girl  ran  to 
get  a  black  scarf.  The  crystal  was  a  large 
pear-shaped  drop,  quite  clear  and  colourless. 
The  woman  sat  staring  at  it,  whilst  the  girls 
watched  anxiously,  and  even  the  young  men 
seemed  a  little  nervous.  But  no  pictures  came, 
though  one  by  one  each  of  the  spectators  asked 
to  try. 

At  this  moment  an  old  Indian  woman  who 
had  been  sitting  huddled  in  the  verandah 
smoking  a  cigar  and  listening,  came  in,  and 
asked  permission  to  hold  it.  I  put  it  into 
her  wrinkled  brown  hand,  and  she  gazed 
intently  at  it,  whilst  we  watched  her  silently. 
Suddenly  she  cried  out  that  there  was  some- 
thing moving  in  the  crystal,  then  that  she  saw 
the  figure  of  a  whit€*woman  swathed  in  white 
draperies,  kneeling  in  a  crouching  position,  as 
if  in  supplication.  She  imitated  the  attitude, 
whilst  her  audience  shivered  in  delightful 
horror.  'And  now  the  figure  is  altering  its 
position,'  she  cried,  and  imitated  it  straighten- 
ing up,  the  head  thrown  back  and  the  arms 


AT    PUERTO     MENDEZ.  57 

extended  as  if  in  adoration.  The  people  in 
the  room  drew  in  their  breath  sharply,  and  I 
too  was  startled.  For  the  Indian  woman  was 
describing,  word  for  word,  the  same  figure  that 
a  psychic  London  friend  of  mine  always  saw 
when  she  picked  up  my  crystal.  I  had  seen  the 
same  gestures  made  by  her,  in  imitating  it,  as 
those  the  old  woman  had  just  made,  and  it 
seemed,  at  the  least,  an  extraordinary  coinci- 
dence. I  questioned  her  as  to  whether  she  too 
saw  a  bright  light  above  the  adoring  figure,  but 
she  did  not.  Then  she  said  that  the  crystal 
was  becoming  blurred  and  milky  again,  and  she 
was  afraid  to  look  any  more.  By  now  it  had 
vindicated  its  character  as  a  magic  stone,  and 
the  two  girls  shuddered  away  from  it  when  I 
held  it  out  to  them. 

I  felt  it  would  be  better  to  bring  in  a  more 
ordinary  atmosphere,  so  when  they  asked  me  to 
look  in  it  myself,  I  hoped  they  had  forgotten 
my  earlier  remark  that  I  never  saw  any  pictures 
in  it.  After  a  few  moments'  gazing  I  declared 
I  saw  a  big  ship,  which  evidently  meant  one  of 
the  party  was  presently  going  for  a  long  voyage. 
This  was  a  lucky  hit,  for  the  smart  store-keeper 
eagerly  explained  that  he  meant  soon  to  go  for  a 
trip  to  Europe,  and  there  was  a  murmur  of 
admiration  round  the  room  :  '  Yes,  the  Senora 
even  sees  the  very  ship  in  which  Don  Antonio  is 
to  sail.  It  is  indeed  wonderful.'  From  the 
verandah  outside  came  voices  saying  the  train 


58  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

was  read}7  and  we  must  come,  but  I  felt  there 
was  just  time  for  another  success.  'Ah,'  I 
said,  '  now  it  is  a  bride  I  see,  very  young,  very 
slim,  all  in  white.'  There  was  an  immense 
sensation.  Laughter  from  the  older  women, 
blushes  and  protestations  from  the  girls.  'Who 
is  the  bridegroom  ?  Who  is  the  bridegroom  ? ' 
*  I  cannot  see  his  face,  but  he  too  is  young,  and 
dark,  and  now  the  crystal  has  blurred  again. 
I  can  see  no  more.'  But  the  success  of  my 
crystal-gazing  was  instantaneous.  The  whole 
group  followed  us  into  the  verandah,  chattering 
and  laughing.  There  was  no  doubt  of  the 
popularity  of  the  entertainment. 

The  air  was  a  little  cooler,  but  men  were  still 
busy  fixing  up  an  improvised  awning  of  canvas 
over  the  open  truck  in  which  we  were  to  travel. 
Chairs  were  handed  up  from  the  verandah  for 
us  to  sit  on;  the  old  Indian  woman  climbed  in 
with  a  basket  on  her  arm  and  a  large  cigar  in 
her  mouth;  the  sallow  girl  sat  on  the  floor, 
dangling  her  feet  over  the  edge,  and,  after  a 
moment's  hesitation,  the  young  half-caste 
joined  her.  Half  a  dozen  other  people  got  in 
too,  amongst  them  a  sad  faced  Paraguayan 
with  his  wife,  and  two  subdued  little  children. 
The  amazing  little  engine,  shaped  as  no  engine 
ever  was  before,  gave  a  wild  shriek,  and,  with 
a  lurch  and  stagger,  the  train  moved  off  along 
the  wobbly  rails  that  headed  for  the  monte*. 


CHAPTER    VIII. 

GUAYRA. 

For  four  hours  we  jerked  clumsily  through 
the  forest.  The  train  is  only  used  for  the 
bringing  of  yerba  to  the  little  port,  and  the 
workers  on  the  property  travel  by  it.  That 
property  stretches  for  a  hundred  miles  along 
the  river,  and  we  were  crossing  a  corner  of  it. 
We  skirted  a  few  clearings,  with  the  blackened 
stumps  of  dead  trees  sticking  up  through  the 
vivid  green  of  young  maize,  and  tiny  thatched 
huts  with  mud  walls,  from  which  a  figure  or 
two  would  watch  us  pass.  More  often  there 
were  only  shelters,  made  of  a  thatched  cover  set 
on  bamboo  poles,  with  floors  of  beaten  earth. 
But  all  scrupulously  clean,  and  the  few 
possessions  tidily  arranged.  Close  by  there 
was  generally  a  pool,  in  which  the  women 
washed  clothes,  the  pool  sometimes  roughly 
roofed  in  with  boughs,  to  keep  off  the  sun. 
These  little  clearings  stand  in  the  midst  of  the 
jungle,  and  are  made  by  burning  down  the 
forest  trees,  then  roughly  breaking  up  the 
ground,  and  planting  maize.  After  three 


60  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

years'  crops  the  ground  becomes  exhausted,  and 
the  settler  moves  on  to  a  fresh  piece,  where  the 
same  operation  is  repeated. 

Now  and  again  we  glimpsed  the  ghost  of  some 
such  little  clearing  in  the  woods,  a  few  rotting 
posts  showing  where  the  hut  had  been.  Already 
the  tide  of  vegetation  had  almost  obliterated 
the  traces  of  human  occupation.  The  rank 
undergrowth  had  smothered  the  clearing; 
bamboos,  and  the  shining  dark  leaves  of  wild 
orange  trees,  made  a  tangle  over  the  stumps  of 
the  felled  trees,  and  the  wild  animals  quenched 
their  thirst  at  the  tiny  pool.  A  small  wooden 
cross  stood  sometimes  on  the  edge  of  the  track, 
marking  a  grave.  No  name  was  carved  on  it, 
but  an  old  hat  or  the  fluttering  remains  of  a 
shirt  were  hung  upon  it.  At  one  place  a  little 
group  of  natives  got  off  the  train,  and  collected 
silently,  with  bent  heads,  round  such  a  grave  : 
but  the  moving  train  soon  hid  them  from  our 
sight. 

We  were  very  weary  by  the  time  the  train 
drew  out  of  the  forest  and  we  reached  the  small 
township  that  stood  in  the  open.  It  seemed 
very  far  away  from  the  outside  world,  and  this 
remoteness  was  intensified  by  the  silence  that 
seemed  to  brood  over  the  place.  The  one  road 
was  wide,  and  on  either  side  were  raised  foot- 
paths bordered  by  trees.  The  soil  was  very  red, 
and  the  vegetation  a  brilliant  green.  Buildings 
stood  along  the  footpaths,  either  stores  or  living 


AT  GU  AYR  A. 


A  PARAGUAYAN  COUNTRY  HOUSE. 


(To  face  p. 


GUAYRA. 


61 


houses,  and  orderly  figures  moved  about :  the 
men  in  white  trousers  and  shirts,  with  a  knotted 
scarlet  handkerchief  round  their  waists,  and 
sometimes  a  scarlet  poncho  thrown  across  their 
shoulders.  The  whole  place  gave  a  curious 
impression  of  being  a  set  scene  in  a  theatre,  and 


over  it  all  there  hung  a  subdued  atmosphere  that 
made  itself  felt  like  something  tangible. 

The  hotel  was  built  on  two  sides  of  a  court- 
yard, and  through  the  barred  windows  we 
looked  at  night  on  to  a  large  ombu  tree  that 


<;•:  nu     uoi  PIN    uivi  K. 

stood  on  a  plot  of  grass,  making  an  inky  black- 
ness in  the  white  flood  of  moonlight.  As  we 
lay  in  bed  we  could  feel,  at  intervals,  a  faint 
vibration  of  the  ground,  but  whether  this  was 
due  to  the  thud  of  the  great  Falls  in  the 
distance,  or  to  SOUK*  seismic  disturbance,  it  was 
impossible  to  say.  The  dining  room  was  in  a 
large  separate  building,  with  lofty  walls,  the 
t'ew  tables  standing  like  islands  in  an  uncharted 
sea . 

After  dinner  we  strolled  out  to  see  a  peons' 
dance. 

The  night  had  come  down  quickly,  and  each 
building  was  brilliantly  lit  by  electricity,  the 
doors  and  windows  standing  wide  open.  The 
thrumming  of  guitars  guided  our  footsteps 
down  the  dusty  red  road,  and  we  passed  little 
Knots  of  people,  making  their  way  in  the  dusk 
to  the  open  space  where  the  dance  was  to  be 
held.  A  few  chairs  had  been  set  for  spectators, 
and  the  electric  lights  at  the  gateway  flared  on 
the  women's  light  print  dresses,  and  showed  up 
the  poppy  red  of  the  men's  scarves. 

The  air  was  motionless  and  warm,  and  the 
velvety  black  of  the  sky  was  riddled  with  stars. 
The  trees  beyond  the  enclosure  showed  as  heavy 
masses  of  deep  shadow,  and  along  the  fences 
there  lounged  a  crowd  of  idlers,  watching  the 
dancing.  The  light  fell  on  them  and  on  the 
groups  of  seated  women,  catching  a  gleam  from 
an  earring  or  a  silver  spur,  showing  up  an  olive 


GUAYRA.  63 

face  now  and  then,  and  carving  black  shadows 
amongst  the  groups. 

The  musicians  plucked  at  the  strings  of  their 
guitars,  and  a  horse  tied  to  a  fence  stamped  in 
the  darkness,  with  a  jingle  of  bit  and  bridle. 
The  music  started,  and  one  by  one  the  couples 
moved  into  the  open  space  and  circled  in  and  out 
of  the  barred  shadows.  They  danced  silently, 
whilst  their  feet  made  a  rustling  sound  on  the 
earthen  floor.  And  always  they  wore  that  same 
look  of  wistful  intentness  which  we  had  already 
noticed.  The  men  rested  their  cheek  on  their 
partner's  forehead,  or,  if  of  the  same  height, 
laid  cheek  to  cheek,  but  there  was  no  abandon- 
ment in  their  attitude.  Restrained  and  mute, 
they  went  through  their  intricate  steps,  whilst 
the  music  rose  and  fell  in  the  silence  of  the 
tropical  night. 

What  was  behind  those  unfathomable  faces  ? 
We  could  not  tell.  We  watched  one  woman,  as 
she  came  past  again  and  again.  As  soon  as  one 
partner  took  her  back  to  her  seat  at  the  end  of 
a  dance  another  stepped  forward  to  claim  her. 
She  was  taller  than  the  other  women,  and 
slight,  dressed  in  a  purplish  stuff  that  showed 
the  colour  of  ripe  grapes  in  the  chequered  light. 
Her  face  was  wide  across  the  brows  and  high 
cheekbones,  her  hair  simply  parted,  her  mouth 
firm  and  sad.  Being  tall,  she  bent  her  head 
slightly  to  rest  it  against  her  partner,  and  this 
lent  her  an  air  of  gracious  dignity  that  gave  her 


64  THE     GOLDEN    RIVER. 

distinction.  The  light  fell  on  her  smooth  olive 
skin,  and  picked  out  points  of  brightness  in  the 
hooped  earrings  she  wore.  Some  of  the  men 
with  whom  she  danced  were  young  and  good- 
looking,  but  she  rarely  smiled,  and  always  her 
dark  eyes,  mournful  and  steady,  gazed  into 
space.  She  seemed  remote  and  withheld,  and 
moved  like  a  figure  touched  by  fate,  through  the 
intricacies  of  the  dance. 

In  her  was  summed  up  that  baffling  sense  of 
mystery  which  enwrapped  the  whole  place.  We 
watched  her  come  and  go,  amongst  the  other 
couples  that  swung  to  the  lilt  of  the  music. 
They  danced  twosteps  and  a  kind  of  Tango, 
very  dignified  and  stately :  and  then  the 
clapping  of  hands  heralded  the  forming  up  for 
the  national  dance. 

It  was  something  like  a  country  dance,  and, 
by  degrees,  a  little  vivacity  crept  into  the  pro- 
ceedings. The  dance  was  rather  like  Sir  Roger 
de  Coverly,  and  as  the  man  and  girl  in  the 
centre  bowed  and  turned  each  other,  the 
onlookers  clapped  their  hands  in  time  to  the 
tune.  It  was  graceful  and  pretty,  and  there 
was  some  laughter  and  fun  over  a  young  boy, 
who  had  to  be  coached  through  his  part  and  who 
burlesqued  his  mistakes  to  win  applause.  But 
after  that  dance  was  over  they  went  back  to  the 
Tangos  and  slow  waltzes,  and  again  that 
wistful  depression  settled  upon  the  dancers. 

We  were  tired,  and  slipped  away  in  the  dark- 


GTJAYRA.  65 

ness,  whilst  the  plaint  of  the  guitars  followed 
us  up  the  silent  road.  And,  later,  that  same 
music  stole  into  our  dreams,  and  wove  itself  in 
scenes,  through  which  the  woman  touched  by 
fate  moved  too,  with  her  proud  and  wistful 
face. 


F 


CHAPTER    IX. 

THE    BIG    FISH. 

Though  it  was  only  seven  in  the  morning,  the 
air  was  already  hot,  for  the  sky  was  cloudless 
and  the  north  wind  blew  straight  from  the 
Equator.  We  were  to  drift  downstream,  and 
the  launch  was  to  follow  and  pick  us  up.  We 
were  then  still  in  the  middle  stage  of  our  career, 
searching  the  water,  sometimes  finding  fish, 
sometimes  not,  painfully  building  up  experi- 
ence. The  river  was  wide,  over  five  hundred 
yards,  and  swift :  we  kept  the  canoe  inshore, 
and  fished  the  streams  which  looked  likely. 
From  my  present  knowledge,  I  know  that  we 
wasted  much  time  over  unprofitable  places. 
True,  we  confined  ourselves  to  the  fast  streams, 
which  was  right ;  you  can  leave  the  slow  flowing 
water  alone  at  this  time  of  year  :  but  we  did  not 
yet  know  how  to  select.  The  water  for  dorado 
is  not  deep,  and  it  is  lively;  look  out  always  for 
a  current  compressed  between  two  rocks;  for 
water  tumbling  over  a  submerged  reef;  and 
above  all  for  a  fast  smooth  racing  glide. 

For  an  hour  nothing  happened.     We  fished 


THE    BIG    FISH.  6T 

steadily,  taking  it  in  turns.  We  had  on  a  spoon 
which  subsequently  became  our  lucky  spoon, 
which  still  survives,  scored  all  over  by  the  teeth 
of  many  a  dorado.  It  was  heavy,  of  copper, 
two  and  three-quarter  inches  long,  and  with  one 
large  single  hook,  of  such  a  size  that,  fastened 
to  the  head  of  the  spoon,  it  hung  just  clear  of 
the  tail.  This  is  far  the  best  arming.  The 
trace  was  two  and  a-half  feet  of  piano  wire, 
with  many  large  swivels;  and  just  above  the 
trace  was  a  small  bullet,  half  an  ounce  in 
weight,  attached  by  weak  string,  so  that  if  it 
gets  caught  the  string  breaks  and  you  do  not 
lose  your  trace.  The  rod  was  an  extremely 
powerful  greenheart  spinning  rod,  ten  and 
a-half  feet  long  :  the  line  was  one  hundred  yards 
of  green  cuttyhunk  followed  by  one  hundred 
yards  of  backing :  and  the  reel  was  a  Silex. 
Such  was  our  tackle;  everything  was  tried  and 
tested,  and  a  better  outfit  cannot  be  imagined. 
We  had  fished  for  an  hour,  before  I  hooked 
and  landed  a  good  fish.  He  was  lying  in  rapid 
water,  where  two  streams  met,  and  he  took  us 
down  some  way  before  he  was  gaffed.  He 
weighed  over  thirty-three  pounds  and  a  half, 
and  he  was  as  lovely  as  a  piece  of  old  jewellery, 
and  as  thick  as  a  carp.  After  that,  my  com- 
panion fished  on,  but  without  a  touch;  and,  as 
I  did  not  much  fancy  the  water  round  us  and 
could  see  no  likely  places  near,  I  suggested  that 
Pedroso  should  paddle  back  to  where  my  fish 


68  THE     GOLDEX    EIVER. 

had  been  hooked.  He  did  so;  my  companion 
made  a  cast,  and,  exactly  in  the  same  place, 
there  was  a  heavy  pull,  and  something  went  off 
downstream  deep  and  hard.  When  about  fifty 
yards  off  he  swirled  up  to  the  top,  and  I  had  a 
good  look  at  him,  and  from  him  I  looked  at  my 
thirty-three  pounder  lying  in  the  canoe,  and 
taking  a  line  from  that,  I  said  to  myself,  that  is 
a  fish  of  between  forty  and  fifty  pounds. 

The  fight  that  followed  is  not  worth  describ- 
ing in  detail.  It  was  exceedingly  dull.  At 
first  all  went  well  and  we  thought  we  were  going 
to  have  an  easy  time.  The  fish  made  one  long 
run  and  then,  hard  and  skilfully  handled,  was 
forced  out  of  the  stream  into  the  slow  water; 
but  once  there  nothing  could  bring  him  to  the 
top.  He  bored  deep  down  in  that  deep  river, 
hanging  on  to  the  line,  sailing  sullenly  round 
and  round,  sometimes  nearly  straight  below  us, 
the  rod  hooped  to  breaking  point  and  the  line 
humming  like  a  harp  string.  He  was  dragged 
down  the  river,  at  one  moment  allowing  himself 
to  be  reeled  in,  then  tearing  the  line  savagely  off 
the  reel.  He  had  been  on  for  forty  minutes, 
and  we  must  have  gone  down  a  mile  of  water, 
before  he  swirled  up  to  the  top,  fifteen  yards 
off,  shaking  his  great  head,  and  lashing  the 
agate  water  into  ivory  foam.  My  companion 
reeled  in  as  fast  as  he  could,  and  I  very  nearly 
got  a  chance  with  the  gaff,  when  down  he  went 
again  into  the  invisible  depths,  and  the  fight 


A    REAL    mG    OXE. 


]!Y    BREAKFAST    TIME. 


(To  face  p.  6 


THE    BIG    FISH.  69 

was  renewed  as  though  it  would  never  end. 
Finally,  after  a  struggle  of  one  hour  and  forty 
minutes,  fought  out  down  two  miles  of  water, 
he  had  to  give  in  and  I  gaffed  him.  The  fisher- 
man was  nearly  as  exhausted  as  the  fish.  He 
weighed  twenty-one  kilos,  honest  weight;  or 
forty-six  pounds. 

The  fight  had  no  particular  incident.  It  was 
the  longest  of  any  we  had,  and  the  only  weari- 
some one.  But  there  are  some  points  about  it 
interesting  to  the  fisherman,  for  it  raises  the 
question  of  the  strength  of  dorado  compared  to 
salmon.  I  have  never  killed  a  salmon  of  over 
forty  pounds,  though  I  have  over  thirty;  so  it  is 
hard  to  compare  :  and  dorado  are  fished  for  on 
very  much  stronger  tackle,  and  on  a  larger  and 
wilder  river.  All  these  facts  complicate  a 
judgment.  But  no  one  who  has  fished  for  both 
will  dispute  that  the  first  rush  of  a  dorado  is 
far  stronger  than  that  of  a  salmon  of  the  same 
size.  It  is  faster,  longer  and  heavier.  It  is 
like  nothing  else  in  the  world.  Before  you  have 
time  to  think,  one  hundred  yards  have  whizzed 
off  your  reel  and  a  great  fish  is  rushing  first  in 
one  direction  and  then  another,  hurling  himself 
out  of  the  water,  crashing  back  into  it  with  a 
bang,  and  shaking  himself  in  mad  fury  at  his 
restraint.  That  is  true  and  it  is  all  in  favour 
of  the  dorado.  But  a  salmon  has  the  advantage 
in  one  point.  He  has  more  resource;  for  he  can 
fight  in  still  water  as  strongly  as  in  swift.  A 


70  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

dorado  cannot :  if  pulled  out  of  the  stream,  he 
loses  something  of  his  high  courage,  for  he  is  a 
creature  of  swift  water,  and  his  fine  mettle 
deserts  him  in  the  sluggish.  He  fights  heavily 
no  doubt ;  but  his  fight  is  of  one  kind  :  he  swims 
deep,  bores  and  jags;  and  he  does  not  suddenly 
change  his  tactics  and  make  an  irresistible  rush 
for  the  stream,  as  a  salmon  will.  A  heavy 
salmon  will  do  all  the  boring  and  jagging  just 
as  well  as  a  dorado,  and  in  addition  he  has  a 
shot  or  two  in  his  locker  which  a  dorado  has  not. 
To  sum  up,  however,  I  consider  the  dorado  the 
gamer  fish.  The  first  few  minutes  of  a  big  one 
give  you  more  than  you  get  in  salmon  fishing; 
and,  pound  for  pound,  he  is  stronger  and  more 
muscular.  But  a  salmon  has  more  resource. 

We  never  got  a  bigger  fish.  No  doubt  there 
are  such ;  report  talks  dimly  of  monsters  weigh- 
ing one  hundred  pounds  or  more.  They  may 
exist.  In  some  remote  water,  above  the  Falls 
of  Guayra,  little  known  even  now,  traversed 
only  by  the  collector,  the  explorer  or  the  hunter, 
the  haunt  of  the  jaguar,  the  boa  constrictor  and 
the  tapir,  a  prize  may  await  some  fortunate 
fisherman.  I  can  imagine  no  experience  more 
glorious  than  a  contest  fought  out  in  the 
unknown  recesses  of  the  tropical  forest.  May 
someone  who  reads  this  book  be  the  lucky 
individual. 


CHAPTER    X. 

THE   FALLS   OF   GUAYRA. 

The  morning  sun  shone  gaily  upon  the  little 
town,  and  a  tame  parrot  on  a  tree  was  talking 
cheerfully  to  himself,  as  we  crossed  the  court- 
yard in  search  of  breakfast.  The  place  looked 
new  washed  in  the  early  light.  We  had  heard 
a  bell  at  six  o'clock  that  called  the  peons  to 
work,  and  by  the  time  we  were  up  nearly  all  of 
them  had  disappeared  into  the  forest,  with 
their  armed  overseers;  some  to  collect  yerba 
leaves,  others  to  work  at  the  clearings  or  on  the 
small  railway.  Looking  down  the  sloping  road 
we  could  see  a  wide  river  dotted  with  islands, 
long  sheds  and  wooden  buildings  at  its  edge, 
and  the  outlines  of  small  craft  tied  to  the  river 
bank.  Beyond  that  the  distance  melted  into  a 
haze  that  betokened  fine  weather. 

The  Parana  River  above  the  Falls  is  three 
miles  wide.  At  the  Falls  it  is  compressed  into 
a  narrow  gorge,  and  the  greater  part  of  the 
water  thunders  in  mighty  rapids  through  the 
head  of  this  gorge.  The  rest  of  the  broad  river 
flows  past  the  head,  and,  turning,  tumbles  over 


72  THE     GOLDEN    RIVER. 

the  steep  cliffs  which  form  its  two  sides.  The 
whole  system  of  falls  therefore  is  an  immense 
half -loop,  at  the  head  of  which  are  the  great 
rapids,  and  along  the  sides  a  series  of  water- 
falls. There  are  eighteen  known  and  identified 
falls ;  but  it  is  certain  that  there  are  many  more 
unknown.  Hidden  as  they  are  in  the  thick 
tropical  forest,  with  impassable  rapids  below, 
it  is  impossible  to  get  a  view  of  more  than  a 
part.  It  was  only  a  part,  and  indeed  a  small 
part,  which  we  saw  :  but  it  is  doubtful  whether 
the  world  holds  a  more  stupendous  sight. 

After  breakfast  we  walked  down  to  the  quay, 
a  small  motor  launch  having  been  lent  us  for  the 
expedition  to  the  Falls.  Guayra,  where  we 
were,  is  in  Brazil  and  above  the  Falls.  We 
were  to  cross  the  Parana  to  the  Paraguay  side, 
land,  walk  down  to  the  Falls,  and  view  them 
from  that  side.  Indian  guides  were  provided, 
and  men  to  carry  our  things.  The  launch  went 
at  great  speed,  trailing  a  wake  of  lacy  bubbles 
behind  her.  Some  of  the  men  clustered  in  the 
bows,  others  on  the  edge  of  the  boat,  or  in  a 
small  barge  lashed  to  her  side.  A  heap  of  red 
embers  in  the  bottom  of  the  barge  kept  the  mate* 
kettle  hot,  and  the  gourd  and  pipe  were  passed 
round  at  intervals.  The  men  were  young  and 
slightly  made,  no  darker  than  an  Italian  or 
Spaniard :  one  in  charge  of  the  party,  more 
swarthy,  with  a  knife  in  his  belt  and  a  revolver 
at  his  side.  Making  a  great  circle,  we  rounded 


THE    FALLS    OF     GUAYRA. 


73 


a  large  island,  and  steering  our  way  amongst 
several  others,  at  last  we  got  into  a  more 
narrow  waterway.  The  water  was  deep  green 

and  clear,  weeds  and 
spiked  reeds  grew 
along  the  edge,  and 
we  glided  along  more 
slowly,  the  V  of  our 
wake  widening  out  till 
the  points  reached 
either  bank. 
After  about  two 
hours'  steam- 
ing, the  launch 
could  go  no  fur- 
ther, and  we  landed 
on  the  low  reedy  shore 
of  Paraguay.  Cross- 
ing a  swampy  piece  of 

ground,  we  plunged  into  the  monte*,  where  it 
was  necessary  to  go  in  single  file. 

We  followed  a  narrow  pathway  that  led 
through  the  forest.  Thorny  bushes  caught  at 
us  as  we  passed,  the  gloom  became  thicker, 
llianas  trailed  from  tree  to  tree  and  threatened 
to  trip  us  up.  Huge  spikey  orchids,  red  and 
yellow,  grew  on  the  trees,  and  the  vegetation 
was  so  luxurious  that  every  plant  had  to  fight 
desperately  for  life.  Stems  shot  up  thin  and 
blanched  to  reach  the  light,  and  creepers  as 
thick  as  cables  wound  themselves  in  every 


74  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

direction.  Ferns,  and  small  delicate  yellow 
flowers,  grew  here  and  there,  but  wilted  as  soon 
as  picked. 

Silently  we  made  our  way  along,  every  sense 
alert,  and  by  degrees  a  faint  hum  began  to  make 
itself  heard,  a  hum  that  strengthened  as  we 
went  further.  It  was  the  distant  sound  of  the 
Falls.  Legend  has  it  that  the  roar  can  be 
heard  twenty  miles  off,  that  people  become  deaf 
from  living  within  reach  of  them,  that  no 
animal  life  can  exist  within  a  radius  of  some 
miles.  Fables  all.  The  noise  is  stupendous 
when  standing  just  above  the  Falls,  but  there 
is  no  truth  in  these  wild  exaggerations. 

To  see  them  properly  it  is  necessary  to  wade 
right  out  into  the  river,  and  we  had  brought 
bathing  dresses  to  put  on.  Rope  shoes  and 
poles  had  been  provided,  and  we  stepped  into 
the  cold  water,  following  our  guides.  The 
current  was  terrific  in  some  places,  and  the 
stones  and  rocks  were  slippery.  From  where 
we  started  you  looked  across  about  fifty  yards 
of  fast  shallow  water  to  a  flat  wooded  island, 
which  shut  out  the  view.  We  waded  across  to 
this;  the  bottom  was  tricky  and  uneven,  with 
shelves  of  rock,  such  as  you  get  on  many  salmon 
rivers.  We  walked  across  the  narrow  island, 
entered  the  river  again,  and  waded  across  and 
down  about  one  hundred  yards  to  the  top  of  the 
Falls,  and  then  got  to  a  rock  half-way  down  one 
of  the  subsidiary  falls  at  the  side  of  the  gorge. 


THE    FALLS    OF    GUAYRA.  75 

It  sounds  an  unbelievable  thing  to  do,  and 
indeed  looked  it.  It  can  only  be  compared  to 
the  feat  of  putting  on  a  bathing  dress  and 
wading  across  to  Goat  Island  above  Niagara. 
It  would  have  been  madness  without  Indian 
guides.  They  led  us  zigzag,  keeping  to  the 
high  shelves  of  rock  where  the  water  was 
comparatively  shallow,  always  ready  to  lend  a 
hand  at  the  dangerous  spots.  Even  so  we  were 
often  above  the  waist,  and  of  course  there  were 
always  the  Falls  below,  their  pull  was  on  us, 
and  it  was  quite  easy  to  slip.  Finally  we  got 
down  and  through  the  top  of  one  of  the  falls 
and  reached  a  rock  half -day  down,  overlooking 
the  main  chasm  of  the  gorge. 

Below  were  the  great  rapids.  The  river 
poured  in  thunder  through  the  opening,  lumps 
of  shattered  water  foam  and  spray,  amber  and 
ivory.  You  cannot  compare  it  to  water  at  all. 
It  was  a  substance  compacted  of  air  and  liquid 
and  froth,  and  yet  there  was  nothing  light  or 
foamy  or  airy  about  it.  The  rush  and  the  stress 
and  the  drive  of  it  had  hammered  it  into  a 
solidity;  and  yet  it  had  not  that  sameness  of 
outline,  that  moving  solidity,  which  is  given 
you  by  the  unchanging  movement  of  a  great 
waterfall :  for  it  was  always  changing,  never 
the  same,  tossed  and  twisted  and  tortured  now 
into  this  shape  and  now  into  that. 

At  the  head  of  the  rapids  stands  a  high  rocky 
island,  the  safe  fortress  of  many  a  macaw. 


76  THE    GOLDEN     RIVER. 

Below  the  island  the  waters  unite,  and  rush 
down  the  widening  gorge,  with  waterfalls  on 
either  side.  As  far  as  you  can  see  are  these 
waterfalls,  thundering  down,  clouded  with 
spray  at  the  base.  The  air  is  full  of  their  noise 
and  their  foam.  It  is  impossible  to  convey  any 
idea  of  the  remoteness  of  the  scene.  It  was 
a  spectacle  of  savage  wildness,  set  in  the 
tropical  forest.  You  felt  confronted  not  with 
a  piece  of  scenery,  but  with  a  great  event  of 
nature.  Except  for  the  little  group  of  yourself 
and  your  companions,  huddled  precariously  in 
the  midst  of  those  roaring  waters,  there  was  no 
trace  of  man  or  man's  handiwork.  You  looked 
at  something  prior  to  man  and  untouched 
through  time. 

Suddenly  one  of  the  guides  shouted  some- 
thing, but  his  words  were  swept  away  in  the 
clamour.  He  gesticulated  and  pointed  to  the 
sky,  and  there,  high  overhead,  flew  a  chain  of 
brilliant  macaws,  making  for  their  island,  their 
long  tails  streaming  behind  them.  We  were 
almost  too  dazed  with  the  roar  of  the  Falls  to 
take  them  in.  Retracing  our  steps  with  care, 
for  a  stumble  might  bring  disaster,  we  reached 
the  forest  again  and  dressed  in  our  usual  clothes. 
Then  another  mile  or  so  through  the  jungle,  and 
jwe  came  to  a  tiny  clearing  where  we  were  to 
lunch.  From  here  we  could  make  our  way, 
through  a  small  tunnelled  opening  in  the  under- 
growth, to  the  edge  of  the  cliff,  and  look  down 


THE     FALLS     OF     GUAYRA. 


77 


on  racing  water  and  still  more  falls,  for  the 
Parana  takes  a  series  of  them  on  its  way  down 
country.  The  crash  of  the  water  was  in  our 
ears  as  we  made  our  way  back  to  the  clearing. 


The  peons  had  made  a  table  with  trestles  and 
boards,  and  the  meal  was  being  cooked  over  a 
wood  fire,  the  blue  smoke  thin  and  transparent 


78  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

in  the  brilliant  sunlight  which  dappled  the 
grass.  The  men  moved  backwards  and 
forwards,  serving  us  with  meat  and  bread  and 
water,  their  picturesque  figures  blending  well 
with  the  background  of  tropical  vegetation. 
Except  for  the  roar  of  the  Falls,  the  forest  was 
very  silent :  no  birds  called,  and  there  was  no 
stir  amongst  the  undergrowth.  On  our  way 
back,  threading  our  way  by  the  tiny  pathway, 
we  saw  a  flight  of  large  parrots  coming  across 
the  sky.  They  pitched,  screaming  and  chatter- 
ing, in  the  top  branches  of  a  tree,  then  wheeled 
away  again  screaming,  their  emerald  plumage 
hard  to  distinguish  in  the  leafage. 

Once  more  in  the  boat,  we  re- traced  our  way 
till  we  reached  the  wide  river,  where  we  caught 
sight  of  a  dug-out  manned  by  two  Indian  men 
and  a  boy.  They  belonged  to  a  wandering 
tribe,  and  were  out  fishing.  Our  boat  swept 
past  so  quickly  on  the  swift  current  that  we 
could  hardly  make  them  out.  They  were 
dressed  in  European  clothes,  and  wore  pieces 
of  wood  through  their  nostrils.  They  paid 
little  attention  to  us,  and  we  passed  them  so 
soon  that  there  was  only  time  to  glance  at  them, 
and  to  feel  a  pang  of  disappointment  that  real 
Indians  should  look  so  ordinary.  They  were 
not  at  all  the  Indians  of  romance. 

The  river  at  Guayra  spreads  out  into  an 
immense  expanse,  and  from  here  it  again 
becomes  navigable  for  small  craft,  and  can  be 


THE    FALLS    OF    QUA  YE  A.  79 

followed  up  many  leagues  into  the  interior  of 
Brazil.  But  the  savage  and  intractable  Falls 
bar  the  door  to  all  but  a  handful.  The  Jesuit 
Father,  Montoya,  sought  to  navigate  them  in 
1631  when  he  led  his  huge  flock  of  Indian 
converts  from  the  settlement  at  Guayra.  The 
fierce  half-breed  Paulistas  from  Brazil,  called 
'Mamelucos,'  had  harried  and  plundered  the 
town  time  and  time  again,  carrying  off  the 
Indians  to  slavery  in  San  Paulo.  And  at  last 
Montoya  decided  to  leave  the  settlement,  and 
lead  his  flock  to  a  place  of  safety  further  down 
the  river.  He  had  hoped  to  escape  by  river,  and 
had  a  fleet  of  rafts  sent  over  the  falls  to  test 
them.  Not  one  escaped.  And  so  he  made  his 
wonderful  pilgrimage  five  hundred  miles 
through  the  trackless  forest,  and  settled  his 
Indians  at  Iguazii  and  at  Loreto  and  at  San 
Ignacio. 

The  only  traces  that  now  remain  of  the 
Jesuits'  occupation  are  a  few  ruins  fast 
crumbling  to  decay,  whilst  the  melodious  names 
of  the  towns  they  founded  still  wake  memories 
of  those  far  off  days. 

Such  are  the  Falls,  untouched  by  man. 
Untouched,  however,  they  will  not  long  remain. 
We  heard  talk  of  an  engineer  prospecting  for 
the  Brazilian  Government,  and  of  other  schemes 
also.  The  railway  too  from  San  Paulo  is 
creeping  down  the  Parana  :  year  by  year  it  gets 
nearer  the  Falls,  and  before  long  Messrs.  Cook 


80  THK     GOLDEN     RIVER. 

will  advertise  excursions  from  Rio,  express 
trains  with  sleeping  cars,  hotel  expenses  and 
guides  included.  Nor  from  Rio  alone  :  they 
will  run  you  out  from  London,  three  days  at 
the  Falls,  at  an  inclusive  charge  there  and  back, 
English  spoken  all  the  way,  and  first-class 
accommodation  in  steamer,  train  and  hotel. 
You  shall  see  what  we  saw,  but  it  shall  be  tamed, 
that  savage  wild  thing,  and  behave  prettily  for 
you.  No  need  to  wade.  A  neat  girder  bridge 
of  constructional  steel  shall  carry  you  out  to  the 
macaws'  island.  True,  the  macaws  will  either 
have  been  all  sold  to  maiden  ladies,  or  have  fled 
with  indignant  shrieks  to  safe  solitudes;  but 
what  does  that  matter  compared  with  the 
marvels  which  you  shall  witness  of  progress  and 
civilisation  ?  On  the  second  day  of  your  three 
(the  first  you  will  devote  to  the  Falls,  as  per 
schedule)  you  shall  be  taken  over  the  new  Power 
House,  and  you  shall  mark  with  approval  how 
all  this  force  has  been  harnessed  for  the  service 
of  man,  and  no  longer  allowed  to  run  to  waste, 
in  Nature's  foolish  fashion;  and  you  shall  swell 
with  satisfaction  at  noting  how  science  is 
continually  making  the  world  an  easier  place 
to  live  in. 

Well,  the  world  must  move  of  course,  and 
to  repine  at  change  is  a  silly  and  futile  attitude 
of  mind.  It  is  not  that,  nor  is  it  distress  at  the 
destruction  of  an  object  of  wild  beauty,  which 
makes  one  question  whether  progress  will  bring 


THE    FALLS    OF    GUAYRA.  81 

happiness.  Often  it  does  not.  No  one  can 
doubt  that  there  was  infinitely  more  happiness 
under  the  rule  of  the  old  Jesuit  Fathers  than  at 
the  present  time.  With  all  the  mistakes  and 
limitations  of  their  time  and  their  creed,  the 
Jesuits  fought  for  human  liberty,  whether 
against  the  open  raids  of  the  Paulistas  or  the 
more  insidious  attacks  of  the  Spanish  governors 
at  Asuncion,  who  regarded  slavery  as  the 
proper  destiny  for  the  Indian,  and  looked  on 
anyone  who  tried  to  rescue  him  with  an  amazed 
disgust.  The  Jesuits  fought  and  they  were 
beaten,  and  it  was  this  which  caused  their 
downfall.  The  fight  still  goes  on,  but  there  are 
no  Jesuits  to  help.  Slavery  formerly,  contract 
labour  to-day,  it  is  one  and  the  same  thing, 
glossed  over  though  it  be  with  the  forms  of 
democracy  and  liberty.  No  one  can  regard 
without  a  sinking  of  heart  any  extension  of  this 
kind  of  modern  industrialism. 


G 


CHAPTER  XI. 

A  GOOD  DAY  AT  DORADO. 

It  was  five  o'clock  in  the  morning.  The  mist 
was  twisting  and  wreathing  and  smoking  on 
the  polished  surface  of  the  water,  and  only  the 
tops  of  the  trees  of  the  Paraguay  forest  were 
visible,  like  shrubs  looking  over  a  wall.  Such 
a  dawn,  misty  and  still,  gave  certainty  of  heat, 
and  we  ought  to  start  without  delay.  Neither 
dressing  nor  breakfast  takes  long  for  fortunate 
dwellers  in  a  hot  country;  at  sunrise  everyone 
is  naturally  awake,  and  the  kettle  was  soon 
boiled,  coffee  and  mate*  made,  and  shirt  and 
trousers  pulled  on.  The  line,  uncoiled  the  night 
before  to  dry,  had  of  course  taken  occasion  to 
snarl  itself  into  a  hundred  tangles,  but  it  was 
reeled  on  the  drum  at  last,  and  rod  and  gaff 
handed  into  the  canoe.  We  paddled  up  through 
the  curling  mists,  and  reached  our  fishing 
ground  long  before  the  red  rim  of  the  sun 
showed  over  the  monte*. 

It  was  my  turn  to  start.  We  had  fished  the 
stream  the  night  before,  but  fared  unluckily. 
I  had  lost  three  fish  running,  all  apparently 


A     GOOD    DAY    AT    DORADO.  83 

well  hooked,  and  we  had  had  to  work  hard  to 
avoid  a  blank.  But  hope  rises  with  the  sun, 
and  it  was  a  glorious  morning.  The  air  was 
caressingly  hot,  but  fresh  as  new  milk  in  an 
underground  dairy,  and  body  and  mind  were 
both  composed  and  alert,  exhilarated  and 
steadied  at  the  same  time.  Oh,  you  who  talk 
as  though  healthy  breezes  and  nimble  airs  were 
confined  to  temperate  regions,  and  as  though 
it  were  only  there  that  the  wind  came  pure  and 
sweet,  whilst  tropic  airs  are  heavy  and 
languorous,  charged  with  beauty  no  doubt,  but 
with  a  beauty  which  is  unwholesome  and 
unnatural,  like  some  heavy-smelling  hothouse 
flower,  or  some  over-scented  woman,  I  wish  you 
could  have  been  with  me  that  morning.  You 
would  have  revised  your  opinions.  You  would 
have  found  that  heat  does  not  destroy  freshness. 
You  would  have  realised  that  a  wind  blowing 
over  hundreds  of  miles  of  untrodden  forest, 
even  if  the  forest  be  tropical,  can  come  as  clean 
and  life-giving  as  any  that  blows  over  peat  or 
bog-myrtle  or  sphagnum  moss.  You  would  have 
felt  a  lightness  of  heart  which  a  lightly-clad 
body  induces,  and  that  harmony  of  body  and 
spirit,  that  rush  of  vitality  and  that  security 
of  happy  enjoyment  which  comes  from  the 
warm,  delicate  and  sparkling  atmosphere  of  a 
hot  country,  which  laps  you  round  and  soothes 
every  nerve,  and  at  the  same  time  freshens  and 
exhilarates  you. 


84  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

This  is  a  long  way  from  fishing ;  but  perhaps 
not  so  far  as  it  seems.  The  mystery  of  dorado 
fishing  can  never  be  understood  if  description 
is  confined  to  mere  catching  of  fish.  He  is  a 
part  of  his  surroundings,  and  his  pursuit  is 
coloured  by  them.  It  is  impossible  to  think  of 
it  without  recalling  hot  still  dawns  with  the 
last  strands  of  mist  quitting  the  water,  or 
blazing  afternoons  when  the  surface  of  the  river 
was  as  metal  fusing  with  heat,  and  the  sun's 
track  could  not  be  looked  into.  And  over  it  and 
round  it  are  the  strange  birds,  and  the  tropic 
sky,  and  the  banks  of  white  sand  and  the  dark 
rocks,  and  at  the  edge  is  the  sombre  forest. 

The  first  stream  tried  was  too  low.  In 
October  the  Parana  may  fall  feet  in  the  night, 
and  what  was  a  rushing  water  in  the  evening 
be  only  a  languid  current  at  morning.  At  the 
swirl,  right  at  the  head,  a  dorado  did  hook 
himself  for  a  few  seconds,  but  soon  kicked  off. 
So  up  we  went,  to  a  stream  near  the  top  of  the 
stream-system  we  were  fishing.  It  was  rather 
too  high,  rough  and  heavy,  and  shot  away 
almost  straight  across  the  river.  It  began  very 
swift,  compressed  between  submerged  rocks, 
then  widened  and  steadied,  with  broken  water 
on  the  far  side,  and  beyond  that  a  racing  glide. 
It  took  two  to  paddle  the  canoe  across  to  the 
head,  but  once  there  we  got  into  a  quiet  eddy. 
I  had  for  bait  a  thin  metal  strip,  five  and  a-half 
inches  long  and  an  inch  wide,  with  a  large 


A     GOOD    DAY    AT    DORADO. 


85 


single  hook  at  the  top  and  a  half -ounce  bullet. 
There  was  nothing  at  the  beginning  of  the 
stream,  and  I  fished  down  steadily,  lengthening 

my  line  and 
pitching  the 
spoon  well  into 
the  tumble  d 
water  on  the  far 
side.  It  was 
shallow,  rocky 
and  swirly.  In 
such  a  stream, 
shallow  and 
also  uncertain, 
where  the  spoon 
is  caught  by- 
violent  back- 
washes and 
eddies,  you  must 
cast  more  down 
than  across,  and 
start  reeling  in 
fast  at  once  to 
keep  clear  of 
the  bottom. 
When  the 


^a    sg-._ .  ^  ^       spoon  was  about 

twenty    yards 
down,  and  being 

reeled  at  full  speed  into  the  quick  current,  a 
fish  took  with  a  mighty  bang,  and  shot  down- 


86  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

stream  like  a  hydroplane  on  the  top  of  the 
waves.  No  fear  of  his  not  being  well  hooked  : 
with  a  spoon  moving  at  that  pace  through  that 
tearing  water  he  either  missed  or  jammed  the 
hook  home;  and  he  felt  solid  as  a  rock.  Down 
he  went,  the  line  slicing  the  water  into  spray, 
then  up  into  the  air  four  feet,  down  with  a 
smash,  then  up  in  the  air  again,  twisting  and 
shaking  until  his  head  nearly  knocked  his  tail. 
Then,  evidently  thinking  he  has  done  enough 
fireworks,  he  settles  to  business.  He  whizzes 
downstream  deep  and  hard,  stripping  off  more 
than  half  the  reel  in  spite  of  heavy  braking  with 
a  wet  glove,  and  on  and  on  till  I  get  nervous. 
Has  he  turned  upstream?  I  believe  he  has, 
though  I  cannot  stop  line  running  out.  Yes, 
my  goodness,  he  has.  There  he  is  right 
opposite,  showing  like  a  gentleman,  a  hundred 
yards  off,  far  above  where  the  line  points.  T 
must  have  sixty  yards  of  bagged  line.  I  reel 
in,  reel  for  dear  life,  reel,  reel,  till  fingers  ache 
so  that  I  fumble  with  the  handle.  I  must  get 
it  in,  I  must,  the  river  is  full  of  boulders  whose 
tops  are  like  hooks.  Thank  heaven,  it  is  in, 
I  am  clear,  and  get  a  direct  pull  again,  that 
lovely  feeling  all  fishermen  know.  The  fish 
celebrates  the  fact  by  careering  all  over  the 
stream,  now  up,  now  down,  now  across,  rolling 
up  to  the  top  occasionally  and  shaking  his  great 
head.  Then  suddenly  he  sounds  like  a  whale, 
flukes  in  air,  and  starts  off  downstream  again, 


A    GOOD    DAY    AT    DORADO.  87 

deep  and  heavy. 

Now  is  your  time.  You  must  stop  him  now. 
He  is  still  full  of  fight,  and  it  seems  unthinkable 
that  you  can  hold  him.  But  this  is  the  crisis  : 
you  must  risk  everything  to  get  him  out  of  the 
stream  now,  unless  you  mean  to  lose  him. 

Whilst  the  fish  has  been  tearing  about, 
Pedroso  has  not  been  idle.  I  have  been  dimly 
conscious  of  being  whirled  downstream  a 
hundred  yards  or  so,  and  now  we  are  lying  still, 
gently  rocking.  We  are  in  a  big  remanso,  a 
lake-like  backwater,  with  no  stream;  Pedroso, 
in  answer  to  my  look  of  enquiry,  nods  encourag- 
ingly. Yes,  it  is  muy  profondo,  very  deep,  and 
the  shore  is  far  off.  A  good  place  to  kill  a  fish. 
And  now  I  have  to  get  him  into  the  remanso. 
He  has  no  intention  of  coming.  He  is  far  out 
in  the  current,  slogging  downstream,  neither 
fast  nor  continuously,  but  tearing  off  an 
uncomfortable  amount  of  line,  and  feeling  as 
uncontrollable  as  the  trunk  of  a  tree.  I  must 
haul  him  in,  before  he  gets  too  far  down;  so  I 
pull  at  him  hard.  The  rod  groans  protestingly, 
the  line  tautens  and  jumps,  jerking  off  rainbow 
spray,  but  still  he  does  not  stop.  Well,  I  must 
hang  on  even  if  I  smash,  so  I  take  a  turn  of  the 
line  round  my  gloved  hand,  and  pull  harder 
than  ever.  Still  he  bores  on,  pulling  the  canoe 
half  round.  At  last,  with  unexpected  sudden- 
ness, just  when  it  is  certain  that  something 
must  go,  I  feel  that  his  head  is  round.  I  reel 


88  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

in,  pull  and  reel,  pull  and  reel  again,  until, 
looking  at  the  filling  drum,  it  is  clear  he  must 
be  in  a  backwater.  The  first  part  of  the  fight 
is  over.  My  companion  reaches  for  the  gaff. 

Down  the  fish  goes,  and  cannot  be  got  up  to 
the  top,  down,  until  he  must  be  forty  feet 
straight  under  water.  Pedroso  just  works  the 
canoe  so  as  to  prevent  him  getting  under  it,  but 
otherwise  we  do  not  move.  The  fish  sails  round, 
boring  and  hanging  on  the  line,  deep  in  the 
water.  But  not  for  long;  he  lunges  up, 
hammers  the  surface  with  his  tail,  goes  down, 
is  pulled  up  nearer  the  canoe,  and  my  companion 
leans  out  with  the  gaff.  The  fish,  however, 
surges  under  the  boat,  which  Pedroso  instantly 
spins  round  on  its  own  axis  to  clear  the  line, 
and  then  rolls  up  to  the  top  ahead  of  it,  churn- 
ing the  water.  Now  is  my  chance.  I  have  him 
on  a  short  line,  and  he  is  on  the  top.  Better 
take  risks  than  allow  him  to  go  down  again. 
He  has  got  his  head  down  for  another  dive,  but 
I  haul  it  up  by  main  force,  and  then  pull  him 
suddenly,  quick  and  hard,  parallel  to  the  boat ; 
there  is  a  flash  of  the  gaff  over  his  back,  and  the 
next  instant  he  is  in  the  canoe.  He  weighed 
twenty-six  pounds  and  three-quarters. 

We  wasted  no  time,  but  got  back  at  once  to 
the  stream.  It  was  my  companion's  turn.  He 
got  hold  of  a  fish  exactly  where  I  had  hooked 
mine,  but  it  got  off  before  it  had  hooked  itself 
properly.  Then,  not  liking  the  spoon,  he 


A     GOOD    DAY    AT    DORADO.  89 

changes  it  for  our  old  lucky  spoon,  the  copper 
one  of  two  inches  and  three-quarters,  and  tries 
a  cast  straight  across  at  right-angles,  reeling 
like  lightning  as  soon  as  the  spoon  alights.  This 
is  immediately  successful,  for  there  is  a  mighty 
swirl,  a  gleam  of  gold  and  bronze,  and  the  reel 
is  shrieking.  Down  the  fish  goes  without  a 
jump,  not  as  fast  as  the  one  just  landed,  but 
with  the  solid  irresistibility  of  a  really  heavy 
fish.  He  goes  across  and  down,  chiefly  down, 
without  coming  up  to  the  top;  we  are  able  to 
drift  with  the  current  and  keep  opposite  him 
without  difficulty,  and  we  reach  the  big  remanso 
with  the  fish  fighting  sullenly  far  across  the 
river,  unbeaten  and  unexhausted.  My  com- 
panion pulls  hard  to  get  him  out  of  the  stream, 
but  this  only  wakes  him  up,  and  causes  him  to 
make  a  long  run  across,  rolling  up  to  the  surface 
at  the  end  of  it,  lashing  his  tail,  and  opening 
a  cavernous  mouth.  He  is  slowly  reeled  back, 
now  coming  in  reluctantly,  now  pulling  the  rod 
point  down  to  the  surface  and  dragging  off  line, 
but  on  the  whole  being  brought  back,  until  he 
must  be  nearly  in  the  remanso.  But  he  does  not 
mean  to  come  yet,  he  is  immensely  strong,  and 
he  has  a  strong  water  to  help  him.  At  length, 
however,  patience  and  skill  prevail,  the  reel  is 
steadily  filling  with  line,  and  almost  before  we 
realise  it  there  he  is,  within  twenty  yards  of 
the  canoe. 

My  word,  he  is  a  big  one !     I  get  the  first 


90  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

good  look,  and  see  how  deep  and  thick  he  is; 
he  must  be  half  as  heavy  again  as  mine.  That 
fish  must  be  caught.  He  is  full  of  fight;  but 
as  usual  he  does  not  try  to  get  back  to  the 
stream.  He  goes  down  and  down,  pulling 
irresistibly,  but  conserving  his  strength.  No 
rod  ever  made  could  bring  him  up  yet.  My 
companion  pulls  and  levers,  and  occasionally 
gets  him  so  near  that  we  see  his  golden  side 
gleaming  through  the  glancing  water  as  he 
turns  in  his  struggles,  but  in  an  instant  he  has 
straightened  and  disappeared.  These  fights 
with  big  dorado  in  still  water  are  long  and 
difficult;  for  a  heavy  fish  will  allow  himself  to 
be  dragged  out  of  the  current  whilst  his  vigour 
is  undiminished,  and  his  might  unimpaired. 
He  then  goes  deep  down,  to  the  bottom  if  he  can 
get  there :  and  as  the  bottom  of  the  Parana  is 
mostly  jagged  rocks  you  had  better  get  him  away 
as  soon  as  possible.  You  may  be  certain  of  a 
prolonged  battle  :  until  you  have  experienced  it, 
you  cannot  believe  how  strong  he  is.  We  had  a 
powerful  rod,  cuttyhunk  line  and  piano-wire 
trace,  tackle  which  would  have  taken  the  steam 
out  of  any  salmon  :  my  companion  held  the  fish 
to  the  limit  of  the  rod's  breaking  strain : 
pressure  which  would  have  brought  a  salmon  up 
to  the  top  had  no  effect  whatever  :  and  the  fish 
bored  and  circled  unconcernedly,  occasionally 
seen  as  a  wavering  shadow,  hanging  on  the  line 
head  downwards.  But  I  know  it  cannot  last 


A     GOOD    DAY    AT    DORADO.  91 

for  ever,  and  I  feel  confident  that  this  immense 
creature  will  be  ours.  So  it  happens.  At  last 
he  is  forced  up  to  the  top,  and  then,  quite 
suddenly,  he  yields.  My  companion  pulls  him 
in  and  I  have  an  easy  shot  with  the  gaff.  He 
weighed  forty- two  pounds  and  a-half . 

It  is  nine  o'clock  now,  and  the  sun  is  high 
over  the  monte";  it  is  very  hot,  and  Pedroso 
paddles  back  to  the  launch.  On  the  Alto 
Parana  in  October  you  can  if  necessary  be  in 
the  sun  all  through  the  hot  time  of  the  day. 
If  you  wear  proper  clothes  you  can  do  it  without 
distress  :  but  since  no  man  wants  to  fish  for 
twelve  hours  on  end,  and  early  morning  and 
evening  are  best,  you  are  better  in  the  shade 
during  the  great  heat  of  the  day.  So  back  we 
drift,  well  content,  lying  lazily  in  the  canoe, 
idly  recalling  the  incidents  of  our  mimic  war, 
wrapped  in  the  pleasant  languor  which  follows 
successful  activity.  After  we  had  lunched  the 
sun  beat  so  fiercely  that  it  took  the  life  out  of 
everything  except  mosquitoes  and  sandflies, 
which  indeed  were  vitalised  to  a  new  malignity. 
There  is  only  one  thing  to  do  in  such  a  situation, 
and  that  is  to  block  doors  and  windows  with 
mosquito  nets,  and  sleep  till  it  gets  cooler. 

We  were  back  at  the  stream  by  four  o'clock. 
The  sun  was  blazing  its  path  towards  the  tree- 
tops  of  Paraguay,  there  was  a  glare  off  the 
water  like  a  flash  from  a  burning-glass,  and  the 
torrid  air  swarmed  with  sandflies.  Life  was 


92  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

unbearable  without  veils,  and  disagreeable  in 
them.  But  in  spite  of  the  glitter  and  the  heat, 
two  more  great  fish  were  captured  out  of  the 
same  stream  before  the  sun  sank  in  a  glory  of 
gold  and  flame,  and  instantaneously  the  quick 
night  was  drawn  like  a  curtain  across  the 
heavens.  We  paddled  back  in  the  sweet  sudden 
coolness,  the  air  musical  with  the  merry 
orchestra  of  the  frogs,  the  surface  of  the  river 
gleaming  opal  and  blue-black;  whilst  our  eye 
constantly  sought  our  two  prizes  lying  in  the 
canoe,  and  lingered  lovingly  over  their  breadth 
and  colour.  They  weighed  thirty-three  and 
a  half  and  thirty-nine  and  a  quarter  pounds. 
The  total  for  the  day  was  four  fish,  which 
averaged  thirty-five  and  a  half  pounds  each. 

Old  dorado  fishers  will  smile  at  the  idea  of 
four  fish  being  called  a  good  day.  Much  larger 
numbers  are  caught,  twenty  fish  a  day  for  two 
rods  being  nothing  unusual.  Most  of  these  big 
bags,  however,  are  made  below  falls,  where  the 
fish  are  collected.  There  are  some  well-known 
places  of  this  kind  on  the  Uruguay :  I  believe 
there  are  similar  spots  on  the  Iguazii,  below  the 
Falls,  though  I  never  fished  there :  there  must 
be  places  at  the  foot  of  the  Guayra  rapids, 
though  probably  no  one  has  ever  penetrated  to 
them :  and  doubtless  there  are  many  others. 
But  on  the  stretch  of  the  Alto-Parana  which  we 
fished,  whether  it  was  that  we  did  not  hap  on 
the  right  places,  or  that  the  fish  are  scattered, 


A     GOOD    DAY     AT    DORADO.  93 

we  never  had  one  of  these  mighty  captures. 
Oddly  enough,  my  first  day,  packed  full  of 
disaster,  might  have  been  the  best,  had  all  gone 
well.  On  other  occasions  we  had  to  work  for 
fish,  often  to  work  hard,  and  we  considered  we 
had  done  well  if  we  got  a  fish  or  two  apiece. 
But  as  compensation  for  numbers,  we  had  size. 
Our  smallest  fish  weighed  eighteen  pounds,  and 
we  got  three  of  forty  pounds  and  over,  quite 
exceptional  good  fortune.  And  after  all,  four 
fish  averaging  thirty-five  pounds  should  satisfy 
anyone. 


CHAPTER    XII. 

THE  RIVER  OF  MISFORTUNE. 

The  Alto-Parana  runs  in  its  upper  course 
through  a  deep  valley,  and  here  it  is  joined  by 
many  tributaries.  Nearly  all  of  these,  flowing 
as  they  do  from  a  high  plateau,  have  falls  not 
far  from  their  junction.  Fish  run  up  and  lie 
at  the  foot  of  these  falls,  and  such  rivers  afford 
good  fishing.  Such  a  tributary  is  the  Iguazii, 
with  its  famous  falls  :  and  not  far  below  its 
mouth,  but  on  the  Paraguay  bank,  another 
lesser  river  flows  into  the  Parana.  It  is 
seventy  or  eighty  yards  wide,  small  by  South 
American  standards,  though  big  by  ours.  Its 
falls  are  some  way  inland ;  we  never  saw  them, 
though  their  thunder  got  louder  and  louder. 
The  river  is  slow  and  sluggish  at  its  mouth, 
but  as  you  progress  it  becomes  faster,  until, 
two  or  three  miles  up,  you  can  get  the  canoe 
no  further.  Here  there  is  typical  dorado  water, 
racing  rapids,  rocks  and  tumbled  streams. 

It  was  on  the  17th  of  October  that  we 
anchored  off  its  mouth.  It  was  a  steamy 
evening  after  rain,  the  air  full  of  intolerable 


THE    RIVER    OF    MISFORTUNE.         95 

sandflies.  We  got  into  the  canoe,  a  large 
boat-load,  to  explore  its  fishing.  We  started 
in  the  usual  humour  in  which  you  engage  on 
an  agreeable  adventure,  and  we  paddled  up  the 
first  reach  talking  and  laughing  and  naming 
the  birds.  Our  mood  appeared  to  be  that  of 
those  expecting  a  pleasant  enterprise.  True,  a 
feeling  of  undefined  apprehension  lay  heavy  on 
me,  but  I  put  it  down  to  the  weather,  and 
apparently  my  companions  did  not  share  it. 
When  we  got  round  the  bend,  however,  and  shut 
out  the  launch  with  its  homely  and  comforting 
everyday  life,  it  became  clear  that  they  did  :  for 
talk  gradually  died  down,  until  silence  fell  on 
all,  even  on  Pedroso  the  light-hearted.  The 
air  was  hot  and  heavy.  A  sense  of  oppression 
lay  on  everything.  There  was  not  a  sound 
except  the  growing  roar  of  the  falls,  the  scoop 
of  the  paddles,  and  the  patter  of  the  water 
under  the  bow.  We  seemed  cut  off  from  the 
world  we  knew.  We  had  stepped  suddenly  from 
the  familiar  into  the  strange.  The  river  was 
sinister.  It  had  clearly  fallen  several  yards 
in  the  last  few  days  and  had  laid  bare  twenty 
or  thirty  feet  of  steep,  glistening  mud,  scored 
here  and  there  by  the  clumsy  trail  of  the  tapir, 
and  thinly  covered  with  an  unwholesome  looking 
water  plant  about  a  foot  high,  sickly  green  in 
colour.  It  thus  ran  through  an  immense  mud 
trough,  at  the  edges  of  which  rose  the  forest, 
sombre  and  impenetrable. 


96  THE    GOLDEN     RIVER. 

As  we  uncovered  reach  after  reach  the  stream 
got  faster.  Rocks  began  to  appear  and  rapids, 
and  we  had  to  pick  our  way.  Pedroso  steered 
inshore,  and  punted  with  his  paddle  along  the 
steep  bank.  Soon  he  could  get  no  further;  he 
stepped  out,  rammed  the  paddle  into  the  sticky 
mud,  and  tied  the  painter  to  it.  We  had 
arrived  at  our  fishing  ground. 

As  may  be  imagined,  apprehension  and 
oppression  vanished  as  soon  as  there  was 
occasion  for  action.  I  took  up  the  rod  and 
looked  round.  We  were  at  the  tail  of  a  racing 
stream  which  reached  as  far  up  as  you  could 
see.  Just  below  us,  some  distance  out,  a  rock 
projected,  with  the  water  packed  like  a  bolster 
above  it,  and  a  long  eddy  below.  Beyond  it, 
the  river  ran  strong  and  deep.  We  were,  at 
this  time,  in  the  middle  state  of  our  knowledge 
of  dorado  fishing.  We  knew  what  sort  of  water 
they  were  not  in  :  we  knew  also,  in  a  sense, 
what  sort  of  water  they  were  in  :  but  our  know- 
ledge was  too  general  and  not  sharply  denned. 
It  is  not  enough  to  know  that  fish  are  in  the 
strong  streams ;  you  must  get  an  eye  for  country, 
which  comes  only  from  experience.  Then  you 
will  be  able  to  tell  exactly  which  streams  they 
will  inhabit  and  what  part.  Knowing  what  I 
know  now,  I  should  not  have  expected  much 
where  we  were,  with  faster  water  close  above. 
So  it  proved.  The  current  and  eddy,  carefully 
fished,  produced  only  one  pull  from  one  small 


THK     RIVKR     OF     MISFORTUNE.         97 

dorado,  which  did  not  hook  itself.  I  reeled  in, 
and,  pointing  up  the  river,  said  that  I  should 
get  out  and  try  higher  up. 

My  companion  vigorously  dissuaded  me.  He 
had  no  reasons :  the  only  difficulty  to  be 
encountered  was  an  extremely  muddy  and  sticky 
walk  of  fifty  or  a  hundred  yards.  A  hooked 
fish  would  certainly  make  down  stream,  and 
there  was  the  canoe  handy.  There  was  thus  no 
reason  in  the  world  against  my  proposal;  but 
my  companion  grew  more  and  more  vehement. 
He  obviously  did  not  want  me  to  go,  and 
Pedroso  backed  him  up.  They  had  no  explana- 
tion, beyond  the  apprehension  which  lay  heavy 
on  all  of  us.  Their  urgency  appealed  to  the 
same  hidden  feeling  in  me  also;  and  I  knew, 
from  some  indefinable  cause,  that  it  was  a  silly 
thing  to  do.  But  I  would  not  admit  it.  What 
possible  objection  could  there  be?  I  laughed 
at  them  and  landed. 

I  can  see  before  me  now  the  place  I  chose. 
The  river,  full  seventy  yards  wide,  not  deep, 
was  broken  by  boulders  and  reefs,  visible  or 
submerged.  Looking  across  the  restless  water, 
you  saw  on  the  far  side  dark  rocks,  which  had 
taken  the  place  of  the  mud  bank,  and  above 
them  the  silent,  moveless  forest.  And,  over  all, 
pervading  all,  dominating  every  sense,  and 
filling  the  hollow  air  with  sound,  the  roar  of 
the  falls  had  grown  louder,  and  had  taken  on 
a  more  menacing  and  insistent  note.  It  was  a 


98  THE     GOLDEN    RIVER. 

strange  scene,  remote  and  exotic,  and  I  seemed 
out  of  place,  with  my  civilised  clothes  and  my 
modern  reel  and  rod.  However,  there  was 
splendid  water  before  me,  and  fishing  to  be 
done. 

He  who  has  not  made  a  cast  into  an  absolutely 
untried  river  has  missed  a  pure  ecstasy  of  life. 
It  was  glorious  to  see  the  spoon  sail  through  the 
air  and  disappear  into  the  unknown.  Glorious 
too  was  it  to  feel  it  immediately  caught  and 
swept  by  that  rushing  water,  and  to  experience 
that  jolly  tug  on  the  finger  given  by  a  cleanly 
spinning  spoon.  Soon,  however,  came  a  tug  of 
a  very  different  sort.  There  was  a  heavy  pull, 
and  that  impression  of  quivering  solidity  only 
given  by  a  very  big  fish ;  and  the  next  second  I 
was  yoked  to  something  unseen  but  mighty 
which  tore  irresistibly  down  stream.  There 
was  plenty  to  do.  The  canoe  had  to  be  reached 
as  soon  as  possible,  and  yet  the  fish  must  be 
held  hard  so  that  he  did  not  get  out  too  much 
line.  So  along  that  steep  and  sticky  bank  I 
shambled  and  squelched,  breathing  a  sigh  of 
relief  on  reaching  the  boat.  We  pushed  off  and 
drifted  down,  and  it  was  possible  to  take  stock 
of  things. 

The  first  mad  rush  was  safely  over.  The  rod 
had  taken  control.  It  appeared  to  be  a  question 
only  of  time  and  fortune.  My  companion 
reached  out  and  put  the  gaff  handy.  All  seemed 
going  well.  Suddenly,  however,  there  came 


IN    THE    HIO    1)E    DESGRACIA. 


(To  face  p.  1 


THE    RIVER    OF     MISFORTUNE.         99 

that  jarring  feeling  which  has  turned  so  many 
hearts  to  lead,  and  I  saw  that  the  line  pointed 
up  stream  when  it  was  quite  obvious  that  the 
fish  was  below.  Hoping  against  certainty,  I 
said  to  myself  that  it  might  be  drowned  line, 
but  a  hard  pull  proved  it  was  not.  I  was  hung 
up.  We  got  the  canoe  easily  out  to  the  place, 
and  tried  all  round  on  every  side.  But  it  was 
no  use.  I  had  to  break. 

It  was  a  gloomy  party  which  returned.  It 
was  more  than  hinted  that  the  disaster  was  my 
own  fault,  and  that  the  line  had  been  allowed 
to  get  bagged — a  suggestion  which  my  jangled 
nerves  repelled  with  unnecessary  asperity.  We 
were  silent  and  morose.  Night  fell  quickly, 
and  everyone  was  glad  to  see  the  yellow  lights  of 
the  launch  reflected  in  the  dark  water. 

We  discussed  the  matter  that  evening  and 
decided  to  try  again;  and  at  five  o'clock  next 
morning  we  paddled  up  once  more.  The  water 
was  much  lower;  the  projecting  boulder  stood 
a  long  way  further  out,  and  we  could  get  the 
canoe  up  to  where  I  had  hooked  the  fish.  My 
companion  cast ;  and  hooked  another  in  the  same 
place  which  behaved  in  the  same  way.  We  got 
into  the  boat  and  drifted  down;  and — his  line 
suddenly  stopped  where  mine  had  stopped  the 
night  before.  The  canoe  was  got  out.  Pulling 
at  the  line  and  working  at  it  with  the  long- 
handled  gaff  I  could  recover  several  yards,  and 
could  feel  that  the  obstruction  was  something 


100  THE    GOLDEN    KIVER. 

flexible.  At  length  a  bit  of  rotten  bough  and 
a  few  water-soaked  leaves  came  up,  and  it  was 
clear  that  we  were  caught  in  a  tree,  jammed 
in  the  bed  of  the  river.  We  had  to  break  again 
and  lose  fifteen  yards  of  line  and  another  of 
our  best  spoons,  of  which  we  were  running 
alarmingly  short. 

We  both  agreed  that  it  was  useless  to  continue 
fishing  there.  The  tree  was  right  in  the  fair- 
way, and  only  a  miracle  could  keep  a  hooked 
fish  out  of  it.  It  was  exasperating  to  have  to 
leave  a  place  presumably  full  of  big  dorado  well 
on  the  feed ;  but  it  was  mad  to  venture  any  more 
of  our  scarce  spoons  on  so  risky  an  enterprise. 
Accordingly  we  tried  below,  with  little  hope 
and  no  success.  Then  Pedroso,  looking  keenly 
at  the  water,  said  that  if  we  dropped  down  and 
crossed  to  the  other  side,  he  thought  he  could 
get  the  canoe  up  to  a  spot  opposite  to  where  the 
fish  lay.  If  one  were  hooked  there,  we  could, 
holding  him  hard,  get  him  down  clear  of  the 
obstacle.  It  was  worth  trying,  and  we  went 
over,  but  without  enthusiasm.  We  fished  with 
a  dull  energy  all  the  morning,  but  never  got  a 
touch. 

As  we  paddled  home,  Pedroso  told  us  the 
story  of  the  river.  We  were  not  the  first  who 
had  come  to  grief  there,  nor  the  first  to  regard 
it  as  sinister.  Its  repute  was  as  evil  as  its 
appearance,  and  all  up  and  down  the  Parand 
it  was  well  known  that  no  one  prospered  on  it. 


THE    RIVER    OF     MISFORTUNE.       101 

Pedroso  himself  had  particular  occasion  to  fear 
it;  for  in  his  wandering  life  he  had  worked  on 
it  years  ago,  logging;  his  canoe  had  struck  a 
rock  and  upset,  his  two  companions  had  been 
drowned,  and  he  had  saved  his  own  life  with 
the  greatest  difficulty.  He  had  disliked  our 
coming  up  it,  and  he  wanted  to  get  off  as  soon 
as  possible.  An  unlucky  river,  senores;  its 
name  is  the  Rio  de  Desgracia,  the  River  of 
Misfortune,  and  it  is  rightly  so-called. 

When  we  got  back  to  the  launch  some  Indians 
who  were  cutting  timber  sent  word  that  they 
could  lead  us  through  the  monte*  to  the  falls, 
which  were  six  hours'  journey  off,  upon  a  good 
track;  and  that  fish  lay  below  them  in  quan- 
tities. We  declined  to  go.  The  reason  which 
we  gave  to  each  other  were  that  Indian  stories 
were  unreliable :  that  it  would  certainly  take 
a  day  to  go  and  a  day  to  come  back :  that  we 
should  probably  find  nothing  when  we  got 
there  :  and  that  anyhow  we  could  not  spare  the 
time.  Those  were  the  reasons  we  gave :  but 
neither  of  us  had  the  slightest  intention  of 
going  back  to  that  river. 


CHAPTER    XIII. 

THE    LAST    DAY'S    FISHING. 

It  was  three  weeks,  almost  to  a  day,  after 
catching  my  first  dorado  that  I  fished  for  them 
for  the  last  time.  Much  had  happened  in  the 
interval.  We  had  had  hard  work,  failure  and 
bitter  disappointment;  but  we  had  also  had 
glorious  successes,  long  battles  fought  out  over 
that  immense  and  perilous  river,  which  ended  in 
the  capture  of  some  mighty  and  untameable 
fish.  So  varied  had  been  our  fortune  that  it 
would  be  difficult  to  find  a  time  when  the 
balance  had  swung  more  wildly  and  un- 
expectedly between  prosperity  and  disaster. 
But  above  all,  we  were  tried  and  our  tackle  was 
tried.  No  more  broken  lines;  no  more  steel 
rings  which  snapped  like  rotten  twigs.  We 
were  reduced,  it  is  true,  my  companion  and  I, 
to  a  single  outfit.  His  reel  turned  out  unsuit- 
able, and  my  line  was  at  the  bottom  of  the 
Parana.  But  the  outfit  which  we  had  was 
tested  in  many  fights.  We  could  trust  it.  And 
moreover  it  was  no  disadvantage  that  we  could 
only  fish  one  at  a  time.  For  myself,  who  have 


AT    AGFA    DORADO. 


«PBHHH 

A    BRACE    OF    BEAUTIES. 


(To  face  p. 


THE     LAST     DAY'S     FISHING.          103 

long  passed  out  of  the  divine  fretfulness  of 
youth,  when  every  second  not  spent  in  actual 
fishing  is  an  agony,  it  was  very  pleasant  to  rest 
after  killing  a  fish,  and  to  admire  the  easy  and 
long  casting  of  my  companion,  and  to  watch  the 
river,  with  its  abundant  and  exotic  bird  life. 
And  indeed  you  want  three  in  the  canoe  if  you 
are  out  for  big  dorado :  one  to  fish,  one  to  gaff 
and  one  to  paddle.  I  can  assure  you  that  it  is 
one  man's  job  gaffing  a  forty  pound  dorado  and 
then  getting  him  into  a  cranky  canoe :  if  you 
had  to  manage  the  rod  as  well  it  would  be  a 
longer  and  much  riskier  performance;  whilst  if 
the  paddler  is  to  gaff,  he  must  either  run  you 
ashore  or  drop  his  paddle,  the  first  of  which 
may  be  excessively  dangerous  for  the  fish,  and 
the  second  for  you.  No,  we  suffered  no  dis- 
advantage ;  we  worked  admirably  together ;  and 
we  never  lost  a  fish  at  which  we  had  a  chance 
with  the  gaff. 

It  was  five  in  the  morning  when  we  left  the 
launch  and  paddled  up  to  our  destination.  If 
anyone  who  reads  this  ever  goes  to  the  Alto- 
Parana — and  any  fisherman  who  gets  the 
chance  of  going  and  does  not  go  will  regret  it 
all  his  life — let  him  on  no  account  miss  La 
Cueva  del  Toro,  the  Cave  of  the  Bull.  How  is 
he  to  find  it  ?  Why,  easily  :  there  is  no  one  who 
navigates  the  Alto-Parana  in  all  the  three 
hundred  miles  which  lie  between  Posadas  and 
Puerto  Mendez  who  does  not  know  it.  Ask 


104  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

anyone  :  ask  the  pilot  who  steers  the  lumbering 
Ibera,  as  she  slowly  noses  her  way  up  the  rush- 
ing river,  with  a  great  barge  or  two  lashed  to 
her  already  portly  side  :  ask  the  captain  of  any 
of  the  busy  and  dirty  little  tugs  which  tow  down 
a  string  of  lighters  laden  with  yerba  grown  in 
Paraguay  or  Matto  Grosso  :  ask  the  men  who 
float  down  the  rafts  of  cedar  or  lapacho, 
carrying  perhaps  great  squared  logs  of  that 
strange  wood,  quebracho,  which  is  so  heavy 
that  it  sinks  in  water  :  ask  any  of  them.  Know 
it  ?  Why,  of  course  they  know  it,  just  as  they 
know  a  hundred  other  points  of  difficulty  and 
danger  :  just  as  they  know  the  dread  remolinos 
of  Santa  Catarina  :  his  career  would  be  short 
on  the  Alto-Parana  who  did  not.  You  will 
have  no  difficulty  in  finding  it.  So  go  there. 
But  do  not  go  when  the  river  is  high.  Go  when 
the  water  is  low  enough,  and  this  shall  be  to  you 
for  a  sign  : — the  long  reef  of  dark  rock,  jutting 
out  on  the  Misiones  shore,  should  be  bare  to  its 
base ;  and  mark  this,  the  water  should  be  so  low 
that  you  should  just  be  able  to  get  your  boat  so 
far  across  that,  if  you  open  your  shoulders  and 
cast  your  longest,  your  spoon  pitches  fair  into 
the  smooth  racing  water  which  makes  an 
immense  V  between  the  two  tumbling  streams. 
That  is  all  I  shall  tell  you.  I  shall  not  deprive 
you  of  the  joy  of  discovery.  And  when  you 
have  cast,  look  out :  he  may  take  directly  the 
spoon  hits  the  water.  But  this  is  going  too  fast. 


THE    LAST    DAY'S    FISHING.          105 

When  we  reached  the  Cave  of  the  Bull  it  was 
apparent  that  the  river  had  fallen  several  feet. 
The  evening  before  we  had  killed  two  great 
fish,  my  companion  one  of  forty- two  pounds  and 
a  half,  and  I  one  of  thirty-three  and  a  half,  in 
the  stream  which  forms  the  arm  of  the  V  on  the 
Misiones  side :  not,  be  it  noted,  in  the  smooth 
water  itself,  which  we  could  barely  reach. 
To-day  this  stream  was  altered  out  of  all  know- 
ledge. Not  a  touch  did  we  get.  So,  after 
consulting  Pedroso,  we  decided  to  get  across  to 
the  head  of  a  rough  stream  on  the  Paraguay 
side,  where  some  black  shining  rocks,  just 
emerging,  showed  that  an  island  would  soon  be 
formed. 

Pedroso  paddled  energetically  across.  We 
wedged  the  canoe  firmly  between  two  flat  stones, 
and  I  stood  up  to  cast.  It  was  not  long  before 
a  fish  seized  the  spoon  and  tore  across  and 
down,  heaving  and  jumping  and  smashing  the 
water  into  spray.  Do  what  I  would,  he  would 
not  stop.  Down  stream  he  went,  leaping  and 
swirling,  and  then  turned  across,  springing 
four  feet  into  the  air  right  away  on  the  far 
side  of  the  stream,  a  hundred  and  eighty  yards 
off,  looking  so  distant  and  disconnected  that  it 
was  difficult  to  believe  that  anything  linked  us. 
To  follow  him  was  out  of  the  question.  He 
must  be  brought  back,  brought  back  with  all 
that  line  out  and  all  that  weight  of  water 
behind  him.  I  had  held  him  hard  all  through 


106  THE    GOLDEN     KIVKR. 

his  rush.  I  now  held  him  harder  still.  He 
was  not  really  big;  slowly,  fighting  every  yard, 
he  allowed  himself  to  be  dragged  into  the 
deeper  water,  where  after  the  usual  boring  he 
was  hauled  by  main  force  up  to  the  gaff.  We 
never  moved  the  boat.  He  weighed  twenty- 
three  pounds  and  a  half. 

There  was  nothing  else  in  that  stream.  My 
companion,  who  is  a  long  caster,  fished  it  for 
some  distance.  In  streams  of  this  sort,  strong 
and  turbulent,  dorado  do  not  lie  all  over.  They 
are  near,  but  not  at,  the  very  top  :  they  lie 
usually  on  the  edge,  but  still  in  the  fast  water  : 
you  may  begin  to  expect  them  ten  or  fifteen 
yards  from  the  actual  head,  and  from  there 
onwards,  for  about  the  same  distance,  you  are 
certain  of  a  pull  if  they  are  feeding.  They  lie 
very  close  together.  The  rest  of  the  stream  is, 
in  my  small  experience,  unlikely,  and  the  tail 
most  unlikely  of  all.  They  like  shallow  water 
running  over  rocks,  but  best  of  all  do  they  love 
the  smooth  racing  water  above  where  the  stream 
breaks. 

Back  we  went,  across  to  the  stream  at  which 
we  started.  I  advised  my  companion  to  let 
Pedroso  get  the  boat  as  far  over  as  he  could, 
so  that  the  spoon  could  reach  the  glassy  water 
between  the  streams.  He  did  so,  and  we 
jammed  the  canoe  up  against  a  rock,  out  of  the 
current.  It  was  a  long  throw  even  from  there; 
but  the  spoon  soared  out  on  a  fine  parabola  and 


THE    LAST    DAY'S    FISHING.          107 

lit  a  good  fifteen  yards  into  the  smooth  water. 
It  had  hardly  sunk  when  the  rod  was  doubled 
up  and  the  reel  screaming.  It  was  clearly  a 
big  fish.  Downstream  he  went,  deep  down, 
not  jumping,  and  he  must  have  been  a  hundred 
yards  off  before  he  showed  himself,  swirling 
up  to  the  top,  rolling  over,  and  showing  all  his 
great  depth.  You  are  apt  to  underestimate 
the  weight  of  dorado,  for  your  eye,  judging 
instinctively  by  length  as  in  the  case  of  salmon, 
allows  too  little  for  depth  and  thickness.  A 
well  fed  dorado  is  wonderfully  deep.  But  by 
now  I  had  got  cunning,  and  knew  he  was  in  the 
neighbourhood  of  forty  pounds.  He  came  up 
twice,  and  then  was  firmly  and  skilfully  pulled 
into  the  backwater. 

Now,  while  this  great  fish  is  sullenly  boring 
and  jagging  in  that  backwater,  something  must 
be  said,  at  the  risk  of  wearying  the  reader, 
about  La  Cueva  del  Toro.  As  has  been 
mentioned,  two  streams  meet  there.  The 
united  current  swings  sharply  over  towards 
the  Paraguay  bank  and  then,  turning,  rolls 
back  towards  the  Misiones  shore,  almost  com- 
pleting a  semi-circle,  and  leaving  a  big,  deep 
still  backwater  on  that  side,  about  one  hundred 
yards  wide  and  rather  more  in  length.  Now 
the  rod,  being  on  that  same  side,  is  always 
working  on  inner  lines.  Wherever  the  fish  is, 
however  far  he  runs,  you  can  at  all  points  of  his 
run  pull  him  across  stream  into  the  still  water. 


108  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

And  this,  with  a  dorado,  is  nine- tenths  of  the 
battle. 

And  so  it  happened.  Pedroso  shot  the  canoe 
into  the  backwater,  and  then  lay  on  his  paddle, 
watching  the  struggle  with  his  bright  eyes. 
Slowly  line  was  recovered.  The  varnished 
splice,  plainly  visible  in  the  bright  sunlight, 
appeared  at  the  top  of  the  water,  wavered,  was 
dragged  under,  reappeared  again,  journeyed 
towards  the  rod  top,  was  torn  back  under  water 
again,  and  finally  emerged  and  was  wound  up 
on  the  reel.  Who  does  not  know  the  joy  of 
feeling  the  rough  splice  run  through  his  fingers, 
and  get  reeled  on  to  the  drum  ?  Yard  by  yard 
the  line  came  back.  The  fish  was  now  not  far 
off.  When  about  fifty  yards  away  he  jumped  : 
a  very  dangerous  and  not  uncommon  jump. 
You  must  always  look  out  for  it ;  your  line  is  so 
short  that,  unless  you  drop  your  point  right 
down,  a  smash  is  certain.  Then  he  sailed  and 
bored  about,  hard  held,  every  effort  being  made 
to  force  him  up  to  the  top.  It  is  not  easy  with 
a  big  one  to  bring  him  up  :  he  goes  down  deep 
and  hangs  all  his  weight  on  the  line.  But  at 
last  even  his  great  strength  tired,  and  there  he 
was,  not  fifteen  yards  off,  a  prize  indeed,  with 
his  deep  pure  gold,  his  black  spots  and  his 
crimson  splashes.  Down  he  plunged  again,  but 
it  was  not  far  this  time  :  up  he  came  a  last  time, 
I  got  the  gaff  into  his  solid  side,  and,  with  boih 
hands,  lifted  him  over  the  edge  of  the  canoe. 


THE    LAST    DAY'S    FISHING.          109 

He  weighed  seventeen  and  a  half  kilos,  or  over 
thirty-eight  and  a  half  pounds. 

Now,  while  we  are  resting  under  a  rock,  I 
want  to  say  something  purely  practical  about 
playing  dorado.  Whether  his  first  rush  be 
upstream  or  down,  you  must  hold  him  hard, 
harder  than  you  believed  it  possible  to  hold  fish. 
Remember  that  your  trace  is  piano  wire  and 
your  line  is  or  ought  to  be  cuttyhunk,  with  a 
breaking  strain  of  about  fifty  pounds.  The 
only  uncertain  factors  are  the  hold  and  the  rod. 
You  will  never  kill  a  big  fish  lightly  hooked,  so 
the  sooner  he  kicks  off  the  better.  As  to  the 
rod,  use  a  strong  one  and  hold  him  as  hard  as 
the  rod  allows.  If  you  do  not  you  are  asking 
for  trouble,  for  he  will  get  right  away  where 
you  cannot  follow.  The  ordinary  check  on  your 
reel  is  not  heavy  enough.  You  must  have  some 
brake.  I  hate  all  mechanical  brakes,  and  you 
cannot  use  your  fingers  as  in  salmon  fishing,  or 
you  would  be  cut  and  burnt.  Far  the  best  plan 
is  to  wear  strong  dogskin  gloves,  the  thickest 
you  can  buy,  and  keep  your  finger  and  thumb 
on  the  line,  and  incidentally  if  your  gloves  have 
gauntlets  you  will  bless  your  foresight  a 
hundred  times  a  day  in  protecting  your  wrists 
from  mosquitoes  and  sandflies. 

Therefore  during  those  first  wild  minutes  you 
must  dominate  him,  or  he  will  dominate  you  : 
you  must  give  it  him,  hot  and  strong,  or  the 
fight  will  be  infinitely  prolonged  and  your 


110  THE    GOLDEN    RIVKR. 

chance  of  success  much  lessened.     At  all  costs 
get  him  out  of  the  stream. 

When  that  is  done,  the  first  stage  of  the  battle 
is  over.  Once  out  of  the  stream,  a  dorado 
usually  does  not  try  to  get  back,  or,  if  he  does, 
you  can  stop  him.  He  tries  other  tactics.  Of 
course  there  are  exceptions.  I  remember  one 
fish  which  beat  me.  I  was  fishing  from  the 
bank  alone,  with  no  boat  near.  I  hooked  a  big 
one,  and  the  only  place  to  land  him  was  a  small 
patch  of  slow  water,  not  fifteen  yards  across, 
right  below  the  rock  where  I  was  standing.  I 
got  him  into  this,  and  I  swore  to  myself  that  he 
should  break  me  before  he  got  out.  But  I  could 
not  hold  him  :  he  literally  tore  the  line  through 
my  fingers,  whizzed  into  the  stream  and  got  off, 
leaving  the  spoon  jammed  in  a  rock.  But  that 
was  an  exception.  Usually  they  try  other 
methods.  They  bore  and  sail  about,  swimming 
deep,  refusing  to  show.  They  are  unbelievably 
strong.  This  stage  is  much  more  difficult  and 
nerve-racking  than  the  first.  You  have  a  great 
fish,  forty  pounds  weight,  quite  close  to  you. 
You  can  see  him,  not  ten  yards  off,  a  bronze 
shadow  through  the  agate  water,  your  first 
forty  pounder  perhaps ;  and  nothing  you  can  do 
brings  him  any  nearer.  This  may  go  on  for  a 
long  time.  I  have  known  it  last  over  an  hour, 
through  no  fault  of  the  fisher,  who  indeed  held 
that  particular  fish  so  hard  that  the  rod  never 
recovered.  But,  long  or  short,  the  same  rule 


THE    LAST    DAY'S    FISHING.          Ill 

applies.  Hold  him  hard.  At  all  cost  get  him 
up  to  the  top,  big  or  little.  Once  on  the  top  the 
end  is  not  far  off. 

We  did  not  linger  under  that  rock.  The 
warning  sun  was  already  showing  over  the 
monte*  and  it  would  not  be  long  before  the 
dorado  went  off  the  feed.  We  paddled  back : 
and  exactly  where  the  last  fish  had  been  hooked 
I  got  one  of  eighteen  and  a  half  kilos,  or  just 
under  forty-one  pounds.  My  companion  got 
another  of  thirty-seven  pounds,  and  I  ended  up 
with  one  of  twenty-four  and  a  half.  Two  more 
were  hooked  and  lost.  All  these  were  lying 
within  a  few  yards  of  each  other.  We  were 
back  at  the  launch  at  half -past  nine  in  the 
morning  with  the  truly  wonderful  bag  of  five 
fish  which  averaged  over  thirty-three  pounds 
each.  No  fisherman  could  want  more. 


CHAPTER    XIV. 

WHAT  THE  DORADO  IS. 

Though  his  English  name  is  the  Golden 
Salmon,  the  dorado  is  no  salmon  at  all :  nor, 
though  his  Latin  name  is  Salminus  Maxillosus, 
is  he  even  a  relation  of  that  noble  house.  He 
belongs  to  a  numerous  but  rather  bourgeois 
family,  the  Characinidce,  whose  members 
inhabit  fresh  waters  in  Africa  and,  more 
particularly,  tropical  and  sub-tropical  South 
America.  Here  they  are  represented  by  so 
many  individuals  and  of  such  diversified 
characteristics  that  they  have  to  be  divided 
into  many  groups,  and  they  are  a  plentiful 
and  powerful  race.  The  particular  genus  to 
which  the  dorado  belongs,  that  of  Salminus, 
contains  by  the  latest  classification  four  species 
altogether.  But  very  little  is  known  of  any  of 
them,  including  the  dorado,  as  will  be  shown  in 
a  moment. 

The  Characinidce  are  a  family  of  fishes  not 
found  in  Europe  and  typical  of  South  America ; 
and  they  occupy  in  this  part  of  the  New  World 
very  much  the  same  place  as  the  Cyprinoid 


WHAT    THE    DORADO    IS.  113 

fishes,  or  Carps,  take  in  the  Old.  In  the  Carps 
are  included  most  of  those  British  fresh  water 
fish  which  are  rather  insultingly  known  as 
'coarse.'  Not  only  the  Carp  itself,  but  the 
Barbel,  the  Roach,  the  Dace,  the  Tench,  the 
Bream  and  the  Gudgeon,  are  all  Cyprinoids. 
There  are  no  carps  in  South  America.  There- 
fore, to  put  it  shortly  and  quite  unscientifically, 
the  Dorado  family  occupy  in  South  America  the 
place  which  the  Carp  family  occupy  in  Europe. 
There  is  little  structural  affinity  between  them ; 
but,  speaking  again  quite  unscientifically,  the 
dorado  with  his  great  depth  bears  some  outward 
likeness  to  the  carp. 

But  the  likeness  is  superficial.  The  dorado, 
built  on  strong,  clean  lines,  could  be  none  other 
than  a  lover  of  fast  streams.  There  is  nothing 
of  the  pond  fish  about  him.  He  is  formed  to 
take  his  pleasure  in  racing  water.  He  is  a 
beautiful  fish.  His  main  colour  is  what  is 
known  as  old  gold  :  a  deep  and  yet  glowing  hue. 
He  has  small  black  spots  on  his  broad  sides,  and 
down  the  middle  of  his  strong  square  tail  runs 
a  crimson  bar. 

I  must  apologise  for  this  slight  and 
amateurish  description.  Finding  the  dorado 
common  in  South  American  rivers,  seeing  that 
it  had  been  known  for  years,  if  not  for  centuries, 
and  that  it  was  valued  highly  for  sport  and 
food,  it  never  occurred  to  me  that  it  had  not 
been  fully  described.  I  therefore  kept  no 


114  THE     GOLDEN     RIVER. 

accurate  account  of  the  fish  at  the  time,  and 
intended  in  anything  I  wrote  to  make  use  of 
the  work  of  some  man  of  science,  which  would 
be  of  much  more  value  than  anything  by  an 
amateur;  and  I  made  no  doubt  that  such  could 
be  found  in  a  book  of  reference.  This,  however, 
is  not  the  case.      None  can  be  discovered,  nor 
can  the  authorities  in  the  Fish  Department  of 
the  South  Kensington  Museum  help.     All  that 
appears  to  be  recorded  is  his  classification.     It 
is  true  that  there  is  a  stuffed  specimen  in  the 
Museum,  but  this  darkens  counsel  rather  than 
otherwise.  The  colouring  is  different  from  that 
of  those  we  caught.     It  is  the  colour  of  butter, 
whereas  the  dorado  when  we  caught  them  were 
deep  old  gold  :  there  are  no  black  spots ;  and  no 
red  bar  on  the  tail.     However,  this  may  be  due 
to  the  fact  that  it  had  to  be  stuffed  by  someone 
who  had  never  seen  one  alive.       But  also  the 
shape  and  make  appear  to  my  uninstructed  eye 
to  be  different :  it  is  too  long  for  its  breadth, 
and  the  head  looks  too  short.     Possibly  two  or 
more  species  of  the  genus  Salminus  resemble 
each  other,  and  are  popularly  called  dorado, 
and  the  stuffed  specimen  is  one  kind  and  we 
caught  another.     Or  I  may  be  mistaken  in  the 
lack  of  resemblance,  for  I  speak  from  memory, 
and  have  no  dorado  fresh  from  the  Alto-Parana 
to  lay  alongside  the  stuffed  one.     Or  the  stuffed 
fish  may  be  out  of  condition.     It  is  impossible 
to  be  certain. 


WHAT    THE    DORADO    IS.  115 

Since  so  little  is  known  of  the  fish,  it  may  be 
interesting  to  give  measurements  of  two;  the 
first  was  a  long  fish,  not  deep;  the  second  a 
thick  one. 

I. 

Female.— Caught  18  Oct.,  1921. 

Weight,  21  kilos,  or  46.28  pounds. 

Length,    snout    to 

end  of  tail        -  42^  inches. 
Length,    snout    to 

centre  of  tail  -  41^       ,, 

Greatest  girth      -  28-J       ,, 

Greatest  depth      -  12        ,, 

Length  of  head      -  12         , , 
Full  of  roe,  grey  in  colour,  the  size  of 
rape  seed. 

II. 

Male.— Caught  18  Oct.,  1921. 

Weight,  15  kilos,  or  33.06  pounds. 

Length,  snout  to  end 

of  tail  -    39     inches. 

[Length,     snout     to 

centre  of  tail,  not 

taken,    would   be 

about  -    38        ,,     ] 

Greatest  girth          -    27         , , 
Greatest  depth         -     11 J       ,, 


116  THE    GOLDEN     RIVER. 

It  is  interesting  to  compare  these  weights  and 
measurements  with  those  of  salmon.  Take 
shape  first  of  all.  A  dorado  is  broader  than  a 
salmon.  Mr,  J.  Arthur  Hutton  gives  measure- 
ments of  large  Wye  salmon  from  1908  to  1920, 
fish  averaging  over  twenty-one  pounds  in 
weight,  and  the  proportion  of  their  girth  to 
their  length  is  .5131 :  that  is  to  say,  a  salmon's 
girth  is  very  little  more  than  half  his  length. 
Now  the  girth  of  the  two  dorado  given  above  is 
.70,  or  nearly  three-quarters  their  length  :  this 
shows  how  much  thicker  is  a  dorado  than  a 
salmon. 

The  comparative  weights  are  puzzling.  A 
good  formula  for  salmon  is  : 

Length  +  J  length  *  girth2 

= weight . 

1000 

Now  on  that  scale  the  first  dorado  works  out  at 
very  nearly  his  actual  weight  of  forty-six 
pounds.  But  the  other  fish  ought  to  have 
weighed  four  pounds  more.  I  do  not  know  the 
reason  of  the  discrepancy. 

It  only  remains  to  add  that  the  dorado  is  very 
good  to  eat.  Its  flesh  is  firm,  and  pale  pink  in 
colour.  Be  sure  also  that  you  taste  the  very 


1  See  Salmon  and  Trout  Magazine,  No.  29,  April,  1922. 

2  See  Angler's  Diary,  1922. 


WHAT    THE    DORADO    IS.  117 

excellent  salad  which  is  made  out  of  the  head. 
From  what  has  been  said,  it  will  easily  be 
understood  that  little  is  known  of  this  gallant 
fish's  habits.  It  is  probable  that  his  original 
home  is  the  tropics.  Dr.  Gunther  in  his  Study 
of  Fishes  says  that  many  tropical  fishes  have 
followed  the  river  system  of  the  Plate  far  down 
into  the  Temperate  Region,  and  if  anyone  looks 
at  the  map  he  will  see  that  this  was  bound  to 
happen.  The  Plate  itself,  the  Rio  de  la  Plata, 
the  Silver  River  of  the  old  conquistadores,  is 
really  an  estuary,  like  our  Humber  on  a  larger 
scale  :  and  just  as  the  Humber  is  formed  by  the 
Trent  and  the  Ouse,  so  the  Plate  is  formed  by 
the  Parana  and  Uruguay.  The  Parana,  with 
its  great  sister  the  Paraguay,  and  many  other 
tributaries,  rises  far  north  in  the  tropic,  and 
between  them  they  drain  a  large  part  of  South 
America  below  the  Line.  The  dorado,  there- 
fore, that  bold,  free-swimming  and  masterful 
fish,  finds  himself  placed  in  a  waterway  system 
measuring  over  fifteen  hundred  miles  from 
north  to  south,  and  rather  more  at  its  greatest 
breadth,  and  it  is  only  natural  that  he  should 
travel  up  and  down  at  his  pleasure,  driven  by 
search  of  food,  or  by  temperature,  or  by  mating 
instinct.1  But  whether  his  movements  are 


1  In  order  to  migrate  up  and  down  the  Parana  he  would 
have  to  pass  the  Falls  of  Guayra.  Having  seen  them  in  low 
water,  I  judge  this  to  be  not  quite  impossible  during  the  long 
periods  of  high  water  caused  by  the  rainy  season  in  the 
tropics. 


118  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

seasonal  and  periodic,  that  is,  whether  he  truly 
migrates  or  not,  is  an  interesting  question.     He 
does  not  go  down  into  the  sea;  and  whether  he 
migrates  in  fresh  water  is  conjecture.     There 
is  nothing  recorded  in  any  book  of  reference, 
nor  can  the  authorities  at  the  South  Kensington 
Museum  say  anything  on  this  point.     One  has 
therefore  to  fall  back  on  the  opinion  of  fisher- 
men, always  an  unreliable  source,  and,  in  this 
case,  contradictory.       Some  fishermen  believe 
that  he  does  migrate,  some  that  he  does  not. 
Some  think  that  he  goes  far  into  the  tropic 
during  the  winter  of  the  southern  hemisphere 
and  returns  to  cooler  waters  for  spring  and 
summer.     And  certainly  the  season  of  fishing 
for   him   bears   this   out.     He    is   fished    for 
during  the  summer  months,  from  September  to 
January.     I  am  speaking,  be  it  noted,  of  fishing 
south    of    the    Tropic    of    Capricorn,    which 
includes  the  whole  of  the  Uruguay,  the  Parana 
up  to  the  Falls  of  Guayra,  and  the  Paraguay 
up  to  near   Concepgion.      Of   what  happens 
north,  on  the  distant  Paranahyba,  or  in  the 
wilds  of  Matto  Grosso,  I  know  nothing.     But 
confining   myself   to   the   southern   area,    the 
Fishing  Guide  of  the  Dorado  Club  in  Buenos 
Aires  gives  September  to  January,  our  March 
to  July,  as  the  season  for  the  Uruguay,  and  says 
that  October  and  November,   our  April   and 
May,  are  the  best  months  on  the  Alto-Parana. 
But  that  of  itself  proves  nothing  :  in  the  other 


UNHOOKING. 


A    FORTY   AND    A    THIRTY. 


(To  face  p.  1 


WHAT    THE    DORADO    IS.  119 

months  the  water  may  be  too  high,  indeed 
usually  is,  and  you  must  have  low  water  for 
dorado :  or  the  fish  may  be  out  of  condition. 
So  little  in  fact  is  known  of  the  fish  that  it  is 
not  recorded  either  when  or  where  he  spawns. 
In  this  state  of  general  uncertainty,  nothing 
can  be  said  which  has  any  approach  to  accuracy. 
One  would  like  to  think  that  he  did  migrate. 
One  would  like  to  imagine  this  bold  traveller 
passing  the  winter,  if  winter  it  can  be  called, 
far  north  in  the  tropic,  and  returning  in  summer 
to  renew  his  vigour  in  cooler  waters.  It  would 
please  the  imagination  to  believe  this.  But  that 
is  a  matter  for  the  imagination,  and  is  no 
concern  of  the  fisherman.  Let  him  know  that 
the  fishing  season  is  from  September  to  January, 
autumn  and  winter  in  our  land,  but  spring  and 
summer  over  there  :  that  October  and  November 
are  the  best  months  :  and  that  he  should  not  go 
to  the  Alto-Parana  before  the  middle  of  October. 
Then,  when  his  canoe  is  almost  pulled  over  by 
the  first  mad  rush  of  a  dorado,  he  will  not  find 
himself  speculating  very  deeply  on  the  problem 
of  where  that  forty  pounder  passed  the  winter. 


CHAPTER    XV. 

TACKLE  AND   OUTFIT. 

This  chapter  is  entirely  practical.  It  is 
written  only  for  the  fisherman  who  means  to 
fish  for  dorado,  and  it  is  to  be  skipped  by  all 
other  readers.  Let  me  say  also  that  it  is  written 
from  small,  though  perhaps  intense,  experience, 
and  that  it  is  confined  to  the  Alto-Parana,  at  a 
point  near  the  southern  tropic.  Many  of  its 
directions,  however,  were  obtained  from  sports- 
men whose  knowledge  is  much  longer  and  wider 
than  mine,  and  will  I  believe  be  found  generally 
useful.  I  know  how  much  I  should  have  been 
saved  by  information  such  as  follows. 

Dorado  are  caught  by  spinning.  True,  I 
have  heard  of  their  taking  the  fly,  and  no  doubt 
a  large  fly,  gold  or  silver  bodied,  would  attract 
them.  But  remember  that  the  fly  must  be 
attached  to  something  they  cannot  bite  through, 
and  this  must  be  piano  wire,  and  I  am  not  sure 
that  a  heavy  wire  trace  mates  effectively  with 
the  delicacy  of  a  fly  rod.  You  had  better  go  in 
for  spinning  at  once ;  and  indeed  spinning  is  the 
obvious  and  practical  method  of  taking  them. 


TACKLE     AND    OUTFIT.  121 

Now  you  can  spin  either  by  trolling  your  bait 
behind  a  boat,  or  by  casting  it.  You  will  not 
get  much  by  trolling,  for  the  reason  that  you 
cannot  take  a  boat  over  the  best  water.  There- 
fore you  must  cast :  and,  since  you  are  fishing 
on  mighty  rivers,  the  further  you  can  throw  the 
better. 

Choose,  therefore,  a  rod  which  suits  you ;  but 
it  must  be  very  strong.  If  cost  is  no  objection, 
probably  split  cane  is  best,  but  greenheart  is 
nearly  as  good.  As  to  length,  ten  feet,  or  ten 
and  a  half,  is  enough  :  and  a  short  rod  has  great 
advantages  in  travelling.  A  three  jointed  rod 
of  ten  feet  and  a  half  has  each  joint  three  and 
a  half  feet  long1 :  and  this  you  will  find  if  you 
measure  it  exactly,  and  providentially,  the 
length  of  your  old  uniform  case.  You  can  find 
nothing  better  than  that  old  battered  tin  box 
to  hold  your  sporting  outfit.  It  will  take  your 
rods,  and  save  the  intolerable  nuisance  of  a  rod 
box  :  it  will  hold  the  few  clothes  you  want :  ants 
and  other  animals  cannot  get  through  it :  and 
it  will  take  also  a  rifle  and  shot  gun.  (It  is 
often  a  good  thing  to  have  a  rifle  with  you  in 
the  boat  when  fishing.)  As  to  the  number 


1  That  is  without  measuring  stoppers  or  the  indiarubber 
knob  on  the  butt.  Therefore  get  your  rod  with  stoppers 
countersunk  on  the  American  plan,  and  see  that  the  knob 
is  measured  in  to  the  length  of  the  butt.  Otherwise  the  rod 
will  be  just  too  long  for  the  uniform  case,  unless  you  take 
out  the  stoppers  and  unscrew  the  knob,  when  you  will 
probably  lose  them. 


122  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

of  rods,  I  regard  three  as  the  minimum. 
Remember  that  you  are  thousands  of  miles  from 
tackle  shops,  and  that  repairs  are  impossible 
except  those  which  you  can  do  yourself. 
Remember  too  that  a  break  in  a  split  cane  rod 
is  usually  unrepairable,  so  that  unless  the  break 
is  in  the  top  and  you  have  a  spare  top,  the  rod 
will  be  out  of  action.  Remember,  lastly,  that 
your  rods  have  to  run  all  the  dangers  of  travel, 
and  of  carriage  through  wild  country  by 
inexperienced  hands,  as  well  as  ordinary  sport- 
ing risks.  So  you  will  do  well  to  take  three, 
and  the  same  number  of  reels.  Please  yourself 
as  to  the  make  of  reel :  choose  the  one  with  which 
you  can  cast  best.  The  only  essential  requisite 
is  that  it  should  be  able  easily  to  hold  two 
hundred  to  two  hundred  and  fifty  yards  of  line. 
No  line  is  so  good  as  that  called  cuttyhunk, 
made  in  America,  but  to  be  bought  in  good 
London  tackle  shops.  At  all  costs  avoid  a 
dressed  line;  the  heat  of  the  tropics  melts  the 
dressing  and  casting  is  a  misery.  Have  two 
hundred  or  two  hundred  and  fifty  yards  of 
cuttyhunk  on  each  reel,  and  no  backing.  This 
means  that  your  reels  must  be  large.  Take 
three  spare  lines.  Cut  one  of  them  into  fifty 
yard  lengths,  with  a  large  loop  spliced  at  each 
end.  Tie  the  splices  yourself  with  well  waxed 
silk  and  varnish  them  with  shellac  varnish. 
Then  when  the  end  of  one  of  your  lines  gets 
worn  by  casting,  as  it  will,  cut  off  the  last  forty 


TACKLE    AND    OUTFIT.  123 

or  fifty  yards,  splice  a  loop  on  the  line,  and 
loop  on  one  of  your  spare  lengths.  By  this 
method  you  will  be  able  in  a  minute  to  change 
line  which  shows  signs  of  wear.  Always  avoid 
knots  :  the  loop  at  the  end  of  your  line  to  which 
the  trace  is  fastened  should  be  spliced  not 
knotted. 

The  trace  should  be  of  steel  piano  wire,  and 
you  must  twist  it  up  yourself;  at  least  I  know 
no  one  who  will  do  it  for  you.  It  should  consist 
of  three  lengths  of  wire  and  four  large  swivels, 
an  inch  and  a  quarter  long.  Each  length  of 
wire  should  be  about  eight  inches  when  twisted. 
The  whole,  therefore,  is  about  thirty  inches 
long,  with  a  swivel  at  each  end  and  between 
each  length.  The  reason  for  so  many  swivels 
and  such  short  lengths  of  wire  is  the  extra- 
ordinary wriggling  power  of  the  dorado. 

Twisting  the  wire  is  important  and  difficult. 
The  point  to  remember  is  that  you  must  not 
merely  twist  the  short  end  round  the  long, 
as  you  will  find,  owing  to  the  malignity  of 
inanimate  things,  it  always  wants  to  do,  but 
you  must  twist  each  end  in  turn  round  the  other, 
forming  an  even  spiral,  like  a  twisted  roll  of 
bread.  Otherwise,  if  the  short  end  is  merely 
twisted  round  the  long,  the  twist  may  draw. 
The  secret  lies  in  this  :  as  you  twist,  see  that 
the  two  ends,  the  short  and  the  long,  stand  out 
at  equal  angles  from  the  twisted  part.  If  they 
do  not,  if,  for  instance,  the  long  length  stands 


124  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

straight  up  in  the  air,  and  the  short  end  sticks 
out  almost  at  right- angles  to  it,  as  each  always 
tries  to  do  in  maddening  fashion,  nothing  you 
can  do  will  prevent  the  short  end  twisting  itself 
round  the  long.  You  may  think  you  are  twist- 
ing the  long  length  in  its  turn  round  the  short, 
and  yet  when  you  look  at  it  you  see  you  have 
not.  You  will  find  it  much  easier  if  as  you  are 
twisting  you  keep  the  two  ends  well  apart : 
that  is,  keep  the  angle  between  them  a  wide  one, 
considerably  more  than  a  right-angle.  AVhen 
you  have  twisted  five  or  six  tight  spirals  this 
way,  then  indeed  you  can  finish  off  by  twisting 
the  short  end  round  the  long,  a  few  close  turns, 
and  then  cut  off  short  with  your  nippers. 
Nothing  on  earth  can  cause  such  a  twist  to 
draw  :  it  will  break  first. 

If  your  fingers  are  very  strong,  you  may  be 
able  to  twist  piano  wire  unaided;  but  most 
people  want  pliers.  Get  two  pair  :  get  the  sort 
of  which  the  lower  part  is  a  wire  cutter  and  the 
upper  has  a  roughened  grip  for  holding.  When 
you  start  twisting,  pass  the  short  end  through 
the  eye  of  the  swivel  and  bend  it  short  across  the 
long  end.  Grip  the  crossing  place  tight  with  the 
edge  of  your  pliers  and  hold  them  hard  in  your 
left  hand.  See  that  each  end  stands  out  at  an 
equal  angle  from  the  crossing  place,  as  has  been 
said  before,  and  bend  and  coax  them  till  they 
do.  Then  take  hold  of  both  ends  just  above 
the  junction  and  begin  twisting.  You  can 


T1IK    EVENING    AND    THE    MORNING. 


FISHING    NEAR    ( OLONIA,    BRAZIL. 


(To  face  p.  12 


TACKLE    AND    OUTFIT.  125 

probably  do  it  with  your  right  thumb  and  fore- 
finger unaided,  if  you  get  a  firm  grip  with  the 
pliers  in  your  left  hand;  but,  if  you  cannot,  you 
must  twist  with  your  other  pair  of  pliers.  You 
will  get  into  it  after  a  little  practice. 

It  has  been  necessary  to  deal  at  length  with 
twisting.  It  is  all-important;  and  steel  piano 
wire  is  such  hard,  jerky,  unaccommodating 
stuff  to  handle  that  it  is  not  easy  to  do  well. 

Now  your  trace  is  made  :  three  sections  of 
wire  with  a  swivel  at  each  end,  and  you  have 
to  fasten  it  to  the  line  at  the  top  and  to  a  bait 
at  the  bottom.  The  top  fastening  is  easy 
enough,  for  you  loop  the  loop  of  the  line  through 
the  eye  of  the  top  swivel.  Be  sure  to  remember 
to  make  this  loop  so  large  that  the  heaviest 
spoon  can  pass  through  it  freely.  The  fasten- 
ing to  your  bait  is  more  complicated.  Suppose 
it  is  a  spoon  :  you  will  see  that  there  is  a  hole 
bored  in  the  top  or  small  end  of  the  spoon 
through  which  is  threaded  a  split  ring  and  to 
this  are  fastened  both  the  hooks  and  the  trace. 
(There  are,  of  course,  many  ways  of  arming 
spoons,  but  this  is  typical  of  all.)  Split  rings 
will  not  do  :  they  are  too  highly  tempered  and 
fragile.  The  wild  shakings  of  dorado  will 
snap  them.  Do  not  use  them.  Throw  them 
away,  lest  you  be  tempted.  Make  instead  a 
ring  of  doubled  piano  wire.  Nip  off  eight 
inches  of  wire  :  you  do  not  want  so  much,  but 
shorter  lengths  of  such  springy  stuff  are  hard 


126  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

to  handle.  Thread  the  swivel  of  the  trace,  the 
spoon,  and  the  hook,  on  to  it.  Pass  each  end 
through  all  three  again,  take  hold  of  each  end 
with  a  separate  pair  of  pliers  and  pull  slowly 
till  the  double  ring  is  formed.  See  that  the 
hook  lies  on  the  hollow  side  of  the  spoon,  with 
its  back  towards  it.  Now  all  three  are  threaded 
on  a  ring  of  doubled  wire,  but  that  ring  has 
loose  ends,  and  would  fly  apart  if  you  let  go. 
Bring  these  ends  together,  still  holding  them 
in  the  pliers,  and  cross  them.  Then  with  your 
fingers  spiral  each  end  in  turn  round  the  doubled 
ring,  exactly  in  the  way  you  fasten  off  your  gut 
cast  when  you  take  it  off  your  line  and  coil  it 
up  to  put  away :  except  that  here  you  spiral 
each  end  in  turn  round  the  coil,  not  one  only. 
The  two  spirals  go,  of  course,  reverse  ways, 
and  meet  at  the  opposite  side  of  the  circle  :  here 
you  can  finish  them  off  by  taking  both  ends  in 
the  pliers  and  twisting  them  together  in  the 
manner  described  before  :  or,  if  you  want  to  be 
doubly  strong,  you  can  spiral  each  end  round 
the  whole  circle,  first  one  and  then  the  other 
on  the  top  of  it,  when  they  will  meet  at  their 
starting  point  and  are  twisted  off  there.  For 
convenience  of  forming  the  spirals,  cut  off  the 
spare  ends  so  that  you  have  a  shorter  piece  to 
pass  and  repass  through  the  ring :  but  do  not 
do  this  till  the  ring  is,  so  to  speak,  set,  and 
will  not  fly  open. 

I  hope  that  is  clear.     It  is  not  easy  at  first 


TACKLE    AND    OUTFIT.  127 

to  make  these  rings,  but  you  will  soon  find  you 
can. 

The  usual  bait  for  dorado  is  the  spoon.  I 
have  read  of  their  being  taken  by  spinning  with 
a  natural  bait,  and  possibly  a  natural  bait  is 
best,  as  it  is  in  most  other  cases :  but  I  cannot 
describe  it  as  I  know  nothing  about  it.  My 
only  advice  would  be  to  use  a  spinning  flight 
composed  of  large  single  hooks,  not  triangles. 
But  everyone  must  have  spoons  in  his  outfit,  for 
not  only  is  natural  bait  much  more  troublesome, 
but  you  are  dependent  on  being  able  to  catch 
the  small  fish  required,  which  you  cannot 
always  do  when  you  want. 

Of  the  many  spoon  baits  we  tried,  three  were 
best,  in  the  following  order.  First  of  all  a 
copper  spoon,  two  and  three-quarter  inches 
long.  It  weighs,  plain  and  unmounted,  exactly 
one  ounce.  Next,  a  thin  strip  of  metal,  either 
all  silver  or  silver  one  side  and  copper  the 
other,  five  inches  long,  and  one  and  a  half  inches 
wide  at  the  broadest  part.  Thirdly,  a  heavy 
spoon,  copper  and  silver,  in  shape  almost  an 
equilateral  triangle,  two  and  a  half  inches  long. 
These  sizes  are  not  final,  but  you  should  not 
diverge  too  widely.  Do  not  use  very  big 
spoons.  For  the  ordinary  spoon,  apart  from 
the  metal  strip,  three  and  a  half  inches  is  an 
outside  length. 

I  consider  that  there  are  two  ways  of  arming 
spoons  for  dorado,  each  of  which  has  advan- 


128  THE    GOLDEN     RIVER. 

tages;  but  whatever  you  do,  avoid  triangles, 
unless  you  want  to  get  smashed.  Use  large 
single  hooks.  The  old-fashioned  blue  coloured 
ones  are  best  by  far,  not  those  modern  smart 
looking  bronze  creatures,  which  are  much  too 
highly  tempered.  Let  them  be  eyed  with  a 
strong  eye.  You  can  either  have  one  single 
hook  at  the  head,  or  two  at  the  tail.  If  at  the 
head  it  should  be  of  such  a  size  that  the  bend 
hangs  well  clear  of  the  tail  of  the  spoon  :  for  a 
two  and  three-quarter  inch  spoon,  this  means  a 
hook  about  8/0.  For  the  metal  strip  use  a  hook 
about  10/0,  and  as  this  will  not  reach  the  tail, 
it  should  be  fastened  to  the  top  ring  by  an  inch 
or  so  of  double  twisted  piano  wire. 

The  other  method  of  arming  is  by  two  single 
hooks  fastened  to  a  ring  at  the  tail,  the  ring, 
of  course,  being  made  of  doubled  wire.  Thread 
the  hooks  on  back  to  back.  They  can  be  smaller, 
about  7/0  for  the  copper  spoon,  and  8/0  for  the 
metal  strip.  You  will  find  this  bait  looks 
attractive  in  the  water,  for  as  it  spins  the  two 
hooks  fan  out  and  give  you  a  copper  fish  with 
a  blue  tail.  On  the  whole,  however,  I  prefer 
the  single  hook  at  the  head.  Always  carry  a 
file  or  whetstone  and  keep  your  hooks  as  sharp 
as  needles. 

There  are,  of  course,  many  other  ways  of 
arming,  and  after  a  bit  you  will  find  your  own 
and  believe  in  no  other.  If  I  am  dogmatic,  it 
is  only  from  desire  to  be  short. 


TACKLE    AND    OUTFIT.  129 

Lastly,  for  leads  get  round  bullets  of  different 
sizes  from  half  an  ounce  up  to  two  ounces,  with 
large  holes  bored  through  them.  Tie  them  to 
to  the  loop  of  your  line  just  above  the  trace  with 
weak  string,  so  that  the  bullet  breaks  off  if  you 
are  caught  up.  A  trace  such  as  the  one 
described,  with  a  half -ounce  bullet  and  a 
copper  spoon  armed  at  the  head,  weighs  just 
over  two  ounces. 

That  concludes  tackle,  and  it  will  be  unread- 
able to  all  but  the  fisherman.  I  sincerely  hope 
it  will  be  some  use  to  him. 

Enough  has  been  said  already  about  playing 
a  dorado.  Gaffing  presents  no  special  features  : 
he  is  certainly  no  harder  to  gaff  than  a  salmon, 
and  if  anything  easier.  But  there  are  one  or 
two  points  worth  knowing  after  you  have  got 
him  into  the  boat.  Do  not  let  him  loose  before 
he  is  dead,  for  a  forty  pound  dorado  kicking 
about  in  a  cranky  canoe  would  be  an  awkward 
companion.  Hold  him  on  the  gaff,  a  few  inches 
off  the  floor,  and  then  let  your  companion  or 
boatman  kill  him  with  a  knife,  at  the  base  of 
the  head,  in  a  little  depression  you  will  notice 
there.  Finally,  do  not  put  your  fingers  into  his 
mouth  to  get  the  hook  out,  for  I  verily  believe 
a  big  one  would  have  them  off.  When  he  is 
dead,  prize  his  mouth  open  with  the  butt  of  the 
gaff,  and  extract  the  hook  with  your  knife  or 
with  a  slip  of  wood.  Your  gaff  must  be  a  strong 
one,  with  a  six  foot  handle. 


130  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

Take  all  your  fishing  tackle  out  with  you. 
There  are  good  shops  in  Buenos  Aires;  but 
London  gives  a  wider  choice;  and,  as  you  must 
cast  long  distances,  you  ought  to  be  absolutely 
suited  with  rod  and  reel.  Steel  piano  wire  you 
can  buy  out  there. 

For  the  Alto-Parana  you  must  have  a  launch. 
True,  there  are  passenger  steamers  which  run 
from  Posadas,  and  they  will  land  you  at  any 
puerto  on  the  river;  but  once  there  you  would 
not  be  much  further  on.  Most  of  these  so-called 
ports  are  only  landing  stages  for  shipping 
timber  or  yerba,  and  you  might  well  find  no 
accommodation,  and  indeed  it  would  be  difficult 
to  get  a  canoe  or  boatman.  Even  if  you  over- 
came these  troubles,  you  would  find  your  range 
restricted.  The  Alto-Parana  is  not  exactly  a 
boating  river.  It  is  extremely  dangerous. 
The  radius  of  a  canoe  is  limited.  You  cannot 
get  up  and  down  the  river  as  if  it  were  the 
Thames.  No  doubt  if  you  went  there  deter- 
mined to  get  fishing  you  could  get  it  without  a 
launch,  for  if  a  man  means  to  get  fishing 
nothing  can  stop  him.  If  two  young  men  were 
to  take  their  luck  in  their  hands,  and  to  get 
themselves  put  on  shore  at  one  of  the  puertos 
and  to  chance  it,  they  might  have  a  most 
amusing  time  if  they  travelled  light  and  could 
look  after  themselves  and  speak  Spanish.  But 
if  they  want  to  do  this  sort  of  thing,  I  should 
recommend  them  to  go  to  the  Uruguay  Eiver. 


.4  *     m  ' 


TACKLE    AND    OUTFIT.  131 

From  Concordia  upwards  they  will  get  splendid 
fishing,  and  plenty  of  roughing  it  also.  They 
would  do  far  better  there  than  on  the  Alto- 
Parana  without  a  launch. 

Posadas  in  the  Argentine  is  the  port  for  the 
Alto-Parana,  and  you  can  reach  it  in  comfort- 
able trains  from  Buenos  Aires  or  Montevideo. 
Launches  are  rather  scarce;  for  the  reason  that 
not  many  people  go  there.  Remember  that  in 
South  America  nothing  gets  done  until  you  go 
there  yourself.  You  may  think  that  your 
launch  is  engaged  and  provisioned  and  waiting 
patiently  and  politely  for  you  with  crew  com- 
plete when  you  step  out  of  your  sleeping  car; 
but  you  will  find  it  is  not.  Everything  has  to 
be  done  over  again.  You  would  get  annoyed 
were  it  not  that  everyone  you  meet  is  so 
pleasant.  All  the  fitting  out  and  provisioning 
of  the  launch  you  can  do  at  Posadas.  There 
are  admirable  stores  there,  where  you  can  buy 
everything  from  rifles  to  raspberry  jam.  You 
had  better  provision  your  launch  for  the  whole 
journey,  and  not  rely  on  getting  anything  on 
the  way. 

In  October  and  November  it  is  hot,  but  the 
nights  are  cold,  and  sometimes  the  days  also. 
Take  thin  clothes,  of  course,  but  on  no  account 
be  without  thick  ones.  Often  have  I  been 
roasted  at  three  o'clock  in  a  shirt  and  drill 
trousers,  and  glad  to  put  on  a  woolly  jersey  and 
tweed  shooting  coat  at  six.  Your  ordinary 


132  THE    GOLDEN    EIVER. 

wear  for  the  day  should  be  the  same  as  for  any 
hot  country,  and  there  is  nothing  particular  to 
be  said  :  but  remember  that  in  a  hot  sun  a  thick 
flannel  shirt  is  cooler  than  a  thin  one.  You  do 
not  need  a  pith  helmet :  get  a  thick  felt  sombrero 
with  a  broad  brim,  which  you  can  buy  out  there. 
For  trousers  or  breeches  khaki  drill  is  as  good 
as  anything.  Take  a  pair  of  field  boots,  but 
make  sure  that  they  really  do  keep  out  the  water 
or  they  will  be  a  curse.  You  do  not  need  them 
for  fishing,  but  for  wet  ground  or  for  the  monteV 
where  there  may  be  snakes.  Take  several  pair 
of  the  native  rope-soled  slippers,  alpargatas; 
they  are  admirable  for  slippery  rocks  or 
wading.  It  need  hardly  be  said  that  waders 
would  be  impossible  and  dangerous  :  the  water 
is  warm  and  you  can  wade  without.  You  want 
gloves  with  gauntlets,  and  a  veil  if  sandfliee 
are  bad. 

Finally,  there  is  a  Dorado  Club  in  Buenos 
Aires,  where  you  will,  I  am  sure,  get  any  help 
you  may  require. 


CHAPTER    XVI. 

OTHER    FISH. 

The  Parana  swarms  with  fish,  many  of  which 
grow  to  an  immense  size.  Any  fisherman  going 
there  would  do  well  to  devote  some  time  to  them ; 
for,  though  the  dorado  is  king  of  all,  there  are 
others  worth  catching,  and  their  strange  shapes 
add  to  their  interest.  In  the  still  nights  as  we 
lay  at  anchor  huge  fish  would  roll  up  to  the  top ; 
and  when  you  asked  the  captain  or  crew  what 
they  were,  the  answer  was  always  manguruzu. 
Now  the  manguruzu  is  an  abominable  looking 
catfish.  It  is  said  to  run  up  to  two  hundred 
pounds  in  weight,  and  I  quite  believe  it : 
certainly  some  of  those  which  splashed  up  at 
night  were  very  big.  Indeed  some  kinds 
of  catfish  grow  much  bigger.  President 
Roosevelt's  expedition  caught  one  in  Brazil, 
three  and  a  half  feet  long,  which  contained  a 
monkey,  and  he  was  told  on  good  authority  of 
one  more  gigantic  still,  called  the  piraiba, 
which  lives  on  the  lower  reaches  of  the  Madeira 
and  Amazon,  is  nine  feet  long,  and  can  make 


134  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

prey  of  man.*  These  are  big  game  with  a 
vengeance,  and  hardly  to  be  recommended  to 
any  but  the  stalwart.  And  luckily  they  do  not 
live  in  the  Parana.  Even  the  manguruzu,  big 
as  he  is,  does  not  feed  on  human  beings.  But 
in  spite  of  his  size  he  possesses  no  sporting 
value. 

There  is  another  fish  called  the  surubi,  of 
which  better  accounts  are  given.  He  is  reputed 
to  reach  sixty  kilos,  or  one  hundred  and  thirty-- 
four pounds.  I  cannot  speak  from  experience  : 
but  a  friend  of  mine,  a  great  fisherman,  had  one 
on  for  five  hours  and  was  then  broken.  He 
could  do  nothing  with  it :  it  just  swam  about 
when  it  liked,  and  stopped  when  it  liked.  It 
was  hooked  on  ledger  tackle  with  a  good-sized 
dead  fish  as  bait. 

The  salmon,  so-called,  is  a  pretty  roach-like 
creature,  very  common,  and  would  give  good 
sport  on  a  trout  rod.  I  believe  it  grows  to  a 
considerable  size,  but  I  never  saw  one  over  two 
pounds  or  so.  They  go  about  in  shoals.  And 
there  are  others  we  caught,  such  as  the  delicate 
silvery  boga,  and  a  sort  of  pike  called  the 
tararira,  and  many  more.  The  small  streams 
which  eventually  find  their  way  into  the 
Uruguay  swarm  with  fish,  and  no  doubt  the 
same  is  true  of  the  tributaries  of  the  Parana. 


*  Through     the     Brazilian      Wilderness.       By      Theodore 
Roosevelt.     1914. 


OTHER    FISH.  135 

In  fact  there  is  a  book  to  be  written  about 
South  American  fishing.  There  must  be  few 
rivers  in  which  a  greater  variety  of  heavy  fish 
can  be  killed  than  on  the  Parana.  I  can  do  no 
more  than  mention  casually  the  names  of  some. 
There  is  the  pacii,  excellent  to  eat,  shaped  like 
a  turbot.  It  is  a  curious  fish,  said  to  be  vege- 
tarian and  to  be  caught  with  melon,  potato  or 
peach ;  but  the  only  ones  we  captured  succumbed 
ignominously  to  raw  meat  on  a  hand-line.  It 
runs  up  to  forty  or  forty-five  pounds.  We 
caught  nothing  so  big;  I  think  six  or  seven 
pounds  was  the  largest.  But  once,  when 
spinning  for  dorado,  I  hooked  something  great 
and  sluggish,  which  certainly  was  not  a  dorado. 
It  sagged  downstream,  for  all  the  world  as  does 
a  big  kelt  in  April,  and  then  sailed  about  until 
the  hold  gave.  We  never  saw  it;  but  Pedroso 
was  sure  that  it  was  a  big  pacu. 

The  last  fish  to  be  described  is  so  remarkable 
that,  were  not  the  facts  well  known,  one  would 
be  thought  guilty  of  a  traveller's  tale.  This  is 
the  man-eating  fish,  found  all  over  tropical  and 
sub-tropical  South  America  from  the  Argentine 
to  the  Guianas.  It  is  called  by  many  names. 
On  the  Parana  it  is  known  as  the  palometer; 
in  Paraguay  and  Brazil  as  the  piranha ;  and  in 
British  Guiana  as  the  pirai ;  but,  whatever  it  is 
called,  it  is  the  child  of  the  devil.  It  is  a 
malign  looking  brute,  short  and  broad,  with 
bulgy  eyes,  a  projecting  lower  jaw  and  razor- 


136  THE     GOLDEN    RIVER. 

like  teeth.  Though  quite  small,  rarely  reaching 
two  pounds,  'their  voracity,  fearlessness  and 
number/  Dr.  Gunther  says,  'render  them  a 
perfect  pest  in  many  rivers  of  tropical 
America.'  They  attack  man  or  any  animal 
that  goes  into  the  water.  Their  jaws  are  so 
strong  that  these  little  fiends  can  bite  off  a  finger 
or  toe,  or  take  out  a  solid  piece  of  flesh  at  one 
mouthful.  The  smell  of  blood  maddens  them, 
and  they  collect  round  their  victim  in  thousands, 
and  tear  him  to  bits.  Many  men  have  been 
killed  :  some  torn  to  pieces  in  sight  of  their 
comrades,  powerless  to  save  them.  Many  more 
have  been  mutilated  in  a  horrible  way.  Presi- 
dent Roosevelt  says  that  in  every  river  town  on 
the  Paraguay  were  to  be  found  men  who  had 
been  thus  mutilated,  and  some  of  his  party  were 
badly  bitten.  Where  they  abound  it  is  mad- 
ness to  go  into  the  water.  They  can  tear  a 
wounded  alligator  to  pieces. 

So  much  for  what  is  recorded :  my  own 
experience,  perhaps  fortunately,  is  limited. 
We  caught  one  on  the  Parana  on  a  hand-line. 
But  they  were  not  common  there,  and  bathing 
is  quite  safe.  In  the  Paraguayan  Chaco,  in  a 
tributary  of  the  Pilcomayo,  one  of  the  many 
called  Rio  Negro,  they  abounded :  my  com- 
panion landed  seventeen  when  hand-lining : 
and  yet  here  too  they  were  not  dangerous,  for 
not  only  our  mule  swam  the  river  unharmed, 
but  two  of  our  party.  Still,  I  do  not  think  any 


OTHER    FISH.  137 

of  us  would  have  gone  in,  after  seeing  those 
seventeen. 

The  piranha  belongs  to  the  Characinidce,  the 
same  family  as  the  dorado;  and  to  the  group 
Serrasalmonina;  though  I  do  not  know  why 
such  a  horrible  beast  has  been  given  a  name 
which  argues  kinship  to  the  salmon.  There  are 
some  forty  different  species,  and  apparently 
several  have  the  same  unpleasant  habits. 

I  have  said  that  bathing  on  the  Parana  is 
safe.  So  it  is,  if  you  keep  to  the  rock  or  sand. 
But  do  not  on  any  account  go  near  the  mud, 
for  in  the  mud  lives  a  ray,  fetid  brown  and 
sickly  yellow  in  colour,  with  a  sting  in  his  tail 
like  an  immense  thorn.  They  tell  you  he  can 
kill  a  horse ;  and  I  should  be  sorry  for  the  man 
who  stepped  on  one.  Our  captain  speared  one 
to  show  us,  and  he  looked  the  embodiment  of 
evil,  -as  though  he  had  been  spewed  up  from 
some  loathsome  under-world.  When  brought 
on  deck  he  drove  his  sting  into  a  board. 

But  these  two,  the  piranha  and  the  ray,  are 
but  slight  drawbacks  to  that  wonderful  river 
with  its  wonderful  fish.  When  there  you  feel 
that  any  adventure  might  come  out  of  it.  You 
would  be  surprised  at  nothing.  Perhaps  some- 
one who  reads  this  book  will  go  there.  Let  him 
spend  some  time,  say  six  weeks  from  the  middle 
of  October,  and  try  for  all  its  fish.  Let  him 
take  tackle  of  every  sort :  for  dorado,  as  has 
been  told;  a  trout  rod,  even  flies  for  small  fish; 


138  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

hooks  and  bait  of  all  sizes  and  sorts ;  and  strong 
rods  and  bottom  tackle  for  some  of  these 
monsters.  He  should  have  something  to  tell 
when  he  comes  back. 


CHAPTER    XVII. 

LIFE  ON  THE  LAUNCH. 

The  first  slender  rays  of  the  sun  were  piercing 
the  thick  skeins  of  mist  which  hung  about  the 
river,  and  birds  were  beginning  to  call  in  the 
monte*.  The  sun's  rays  shone  in  through  the 
small  windows  of  the  saloon,  and  one  by  one  we, 
too,  like  the  birds,  awoke.  It  was  5.30  a.m., 
our  usual  time  for  getting  up.  In  the  wilds 
one  quickly  falls  into  a  habit  of  daylight  saving. 
Besides  which,  the  dorado  fishing  is  at  its  best 
in  the  very  early  morning.  Our  beds  were  on 
the  floor,  we  two  women  on  one  side  of  the 
impromptu  curtain  that  made  our  saloon  into 
two  bedrooms  at  night,  the  men  on  the  other. 
A  mosquito  net,  hung  from  a  nail,  was  well 
tucked  in  round  each  pair  of  mattresses,  and 
each  of  us  was  careful  to  have  a  watch,  an 
electric  torch,  and  a  small  bottle  of  citronella 
under  the  pillow.  Let  no  one  start  for  a  journey 
up  a  tropical  river  without  citronella  :  sooner 
let  him  go  without  sufficient  food  or  clothing. 
It  is  the  only  thing  that  keeps  sandflies  and 
mosquitoes  off,  and  unlike  some  other  concoc- 


140  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

tions,  it  does  not  also  keep  one's  fellow-men  at 
bay.  It  has  a  fresh,  lemony  scent,  not 
unpleasant;  and  a  few  drops  put  on  the  face 
and  hands  keep  one  free  from  the  torment  of 
biting  and  stinging  insects.  But  it  was  still 
too  early  in  the  day  for  these  pests,  and  the 
mosquito  curtain  could  be  rolled  up.  We  put 
on  dressing  gowns  and  boudoir  caps,  ready  for 
early  coffee,  whilst  the  fishers  went  off  to  wash 
and  dress,  shouting  to  Jerman  to  bring  the 
coffee. 

We  had  evolved  a  set  of  rules  for  the  peaceful 
ordering  of  our  small  community,  and  the  first 
of  them  was  that  each  person  must  fold  up  his 
or  her  bedding  neatly,  on  getting  up.  So  the 
men's  '  bedroom  '  was  quite  tidy  by  the  time  the 
coffee  came.  My  sister  and  I  sat  up  in  bed  for 
our  early  breakfast,  since  there  was  nowhere 
else  to  sit.  And  we  all  talked  hard,  discussing 
the  catch  of  the  previous  day  and  the  chances  of 
to-day,  whilst  we  drank  coffee  sweetened  with 
tinned  milk,  and  ate  slices  of  bread  and  jam. 
As  soon  as  we  had  finished,  there  was  the 
usual  important  bustle  of  the  fishermen's 
departure :  rods,  tackle,  and  the  gaff  fetched, 
Pedroso's  dark  face  beaming  from  the  canoe, 
and  the  whole  crew  collecting  to  watch  :  the 
Capitan  with  the  benevolent  expression  of  a 
fellow-sportsman ;  the  young  engineer  laughing 
and  rubbing  his  oily  hands  on  a  piece  of  cotton 
waste;  Jerman,  the  cook,  housemaid  and 


LIFE    ON    THE    LAUNCH. 


141 


butler    in    one,    shouting    chaff    to    Pedroso. 
The    mists    had    rolled    away,     and     the 
individual   feathery  trees  of  the  monte*   had 
materialised  from  a  vague  wash  of  foliage  : 
there  was  the  sudden  plop  of 
a  rising  fish  in  the  dark  pool 
at  the  mouth  of  a  small  tribu- 
tary, the  sun  was  sparkling 
on   the   river,    bringing   out 
gleams  of  gold  here  and  there, 
and  the  three  intent  figures  in 
the  small  canoe  made  their 
slow        way 
against    the 
fierce     strength 
of  the  current. 

They  were 
gone.  Jerman, 
still  twiddling 
his  moustache 

and  gazing  at  the  retreating  canoe,  was 
galvanised  to  fresh  activities  by  our  shouts  for 
hot  water,  and  for  the  next  quarter  of  an  hour 
he  shambled  backwards  and  forwards  with  the 
docility  of  an  elephant,  bringing  kettlefuls  of 
hot  water  to  the  door  of  the  tiny  washing  place  : 
so  tiny  a  place  that  it  was  fortunate  none  o£  us 
was  very  fat.  As  soon  as  we  were  dressed  he 
was  wanted  again,  this  time  to  carry  up  the 
heaps  of  bedding  to  the  roof  of  the  launch, 
where  they  baked  all  day  in  the  sun.  Then  he 


142  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

had  to  sweep  and  dust  the  saloon,  after  which 
came  the  important  discussion  as  to  what  we 
were  to  have  for  lunch.  We  had  laid  in  a  stock 
of  tinned  provisions  before  starting  :  bully  beef, 
tongues,  sardines,  tinned  asparagus  and  fruit, 
also  flour,  cheese,  rice,  eggs,  tea  and  coffee, 
potatoes  and  green  vegetables,  a  sack  of  ship's 
biscuits  and  a  supply  of  red  wine,  soda  water, 
and  whiskey.  The  fresh  meat  we  had  brought 
had  had  to  be  cut  into  strips  and  hung  in  the 
sun  to  dry,  where  by  degrees  it  achieved  the 
colour  and  consistency  of  an  Egyptian  mummy 
of  an  early  dynasty.  The  loaves  of  bread  we 
had  taken  with  us  had  been  finished  long  ago. 
It  had  been  a  matter  of  importance,  the 
laying  in  of  our  stores,  for  we  had  been  warned 
that  it  would  be  difficult,  if  not  impossible,  to 
supplement  them  once  we  had  started.  And  so 
it  proved.  Posadas  has  excellent  stores,  and 
we  had  remembered  everything,  fortunately, 
and  never  ran  short  in  our  three  weeks'  trip. 
The  crew  provided  their  own  food  :  and  there 
were  dorado  for  all.  Whilst  the  eggs  lasted  we 
had  begun  our  lunch  with  an  omelet,  but  such 
halcyon  days  were  over.  'And  what  will  the 
senores  eat  to-day  ? '  would  enquire  Jerman 
cheerfully,  with  the  air  of  a  chef  behind  whom 
loomed  vast  larders  and  store-cupboards. 
Grilled  steaks  of  dorado,  at  any  rate,  and  let 
Jerman  be  sure  they  were  served  very  hot,  with 
chipped  potatoes.  And  how  excellent  is  grilled 


LIFE    ON    THE    LAUNCH.  143 

dorado !  It  has  the  consistency  of  salmon,  but 
is  of  a  paler  pink  colour  and  not  quite  so  rich. 
An  epicure  who  has  not  tasted  grilled  steak 
from  a  dorado  fresh  caught  in  the  clear  water 
below  the  fall  of  some  small  river  into  the 
Parana,  cannot  claim  to  have  sounded  the 
whole  gamut  of  gustatory  joys.  The  next 
question  was  whether  to  have  bully  beef  or 
tongue,  and  the  latter  was  chosen  unanimously, 
to  be  served  with  asparagus.  'And  a  dorado 
salad  ? '  enquired  Jerman  persuasively,  who 
prided  himself  on  this  dish,  made  of  the  flesh 
from  the  head  of  the  dorado,  mixed  with 
plentiful  supplies  of  onion  and  garlic.  'And 
then  peaches,'  we  pronounced  firmly,  having 
given  in  over  the  salad. 

The  ordering  of  luncheon  over,  the  next 
thing  was  to  get  some  washing  done,  whilst  we 
had  the  saloon  to  ourselves.  We  borrowed  two 
buckets  from  Jerman,  who  again  provided  an 
inexhaustible  supply  of  hot  water  from  his  tiny 
cubby-hole  of  a  kitchen.  He  did  the  washing 
of  sheets  and  pillow-cases  and  the  men's  clothes, 
but  we  did  our  own,  and  had  brought  plenty  of 
Sunlight  soap  with  us.  As  the  things  were 
washed  we  hung  them  up  to  dry  along  the  rails 
of  the  launch,  and  in  an  hour's  time  they  were 
ready  to  iron.  We  had  brought  a  small  iron 
with  us,  heated  by  methylated  spirit,  and  it  was 
one  of  our  happiest  inspirations.  I  settled 
down  to  the  ironing,  whilst  my  companion  went 


144  THE    GOLDEN     RIVER. 

off  to  bake  some  bread,  with  frequent  shouts  to 
me  of  'What  do  you  call  baking  powder  in 
Spanish  ? '  or  '  How  can  I  explain  to  Jerman 
that  he  must  on  no  account  open  the  oven  door  ? ' 
A  tiny  breeze  got  up,  and  flapped  the  linen 
hanging  out  to  air,  and  now  and  again  we  went 
out  on  deck  to  see  if  the  fishermen  were  in  sight. 
Sometimes  we  had  been  able,  with  our  glasses, 
to  watch  the  playing  and  landing  of  a  dorado, 
and  even  to  catch  something  of  the  tense  strain 
and  excitement  of  the  tiny  doll  figures  in  their 
chip  of  a  boat,  whilst  the  Capitan  and  Jerman 
hung  breathlessly  on  our  exclamations  and 
groaned  as  heavily  as  the  fishermen  themselves 
when  the  leaping  surging  dot  we  knew  to  be  a 
dorado  broke  and  got  away. 

Ten  o'clock,  and  they  might  be  back  at  any 
moment,  just  time  to  finish  before  the  Capitan 
called  that  they  were  coming.  There  was  the 
little  canoe,  like  a  dark  straw  on  the  river,  and 
we  watched  its  approach,  and  could  see  a  gleam 
of  gold  at  the  bottom  of  it.  The  sun  was  getting 
high,  the  hot  air  already  shimmered  and  danced 
above  the  water,  and  a  flock  of  parrots  screamed 
in  the  treetops.  Already  the  engineer  was 
trying  his  engines,  and  the  launch  was  shivering 
like  a  highly-bred  fox-terrier,  keen  to  start. 

It  was  exciting,  when  the  canoe  was  within 
hail,  to  hear  how  many  fish  had  been  caught, 
and  to  see  the  splendid  red  gold  of  the  huge 
dorado  as  they  were  hoisted  on  deck,  to  a  chorus 


LIFE    ON    THE    LAUNCH.  145 

of  admiring  exclamations.  The  first  thing  was 
to  weigh  them,  and  to  hear  the  whole  story  of 
their  being  caught.  Then,  perhaps,  to  photo- 
graph them.  Then  drinks  in  the  saloon,  and 
'  Have  I  the  permission  of  the  senores  to  start, 
now  ? '  came  the  voice  of  the  Capitan,  and  he 
strode  across  to  settle  himself  at  the  wheel. 
The  engines  would  begin  to  throb  and  vibrate, 
the  floor  to  jig  under  our  feet,  and  there  was  a 
hasty  snatch  at  tumblers  standing  near  the  edge 
of  the  table.  The  Lelia  backed  out  of  the  little 
bay  where  she  had  spent  the  night,  snorting  and 
puffing,  the  parrots  flew  shrieking  away,  we 
churned  the  water  in  a  foaming  circle,  then  got 
under  way,  and  quickly  the  white  sand  and  the 
dark  green  ring  of  monte"  that  edged  it  slid  out 
of  sight.  We  had  but  ruffled  its  quiet  for  a 
moment,  like  a  wandering  bird  that  settles  with 
folded  wings  for  the  night,  leaving  as  little 
trace  as  some  such  bird  when  we  spread  our 
wings  and  passed  on. 

The  next  few  hours  meant  hard  work  for  the 
Capitan.  He  had  to  watch  with  the  eye  of  a 
hawk  for  a  safe  pathway  up  the  river,  amongst 
whirlpools  and  rapids.  Sometimes  we  clung  to 
one  bank  or  the  other,  edging  our  way  cautiously 
through  the  turmoil ;  sometimes  we  made  a  dash 
from  one  side  to  another,  avoiding  the  black 
gaping  mouths  of  the  whirlpools  as  though  by 
magic.  Never  did  he  take  his  eyes  off  the 
treacherous  water  for  a  moment.  Pedroso 


146 


THE    GOLDEN     RIVER. 


rigged  up  an  awning  over  the  tiny  deck,  and  we 
sat  eating  fresh  oranges,  our  field-glasses  ready 
to  watch  any  bird  or  beast  that  stirred  along 
the  bank.  By  11.30  we  were  all  hungry,  and 
had  lunch,  whilst  Jerman  with  arms  akimbo 
stood  with  his  head  on  one  side,  waiting  for  the 
expected  applause  when  the  salad  was  brought 

in.  'Never  have  I 
lunched  better,  Jerman,' 
remarked  the  perjure^ 
Bird-lover,  serenely  rele- 
gating Claridge's  and 
the  Ritz  to  oblivion. 
And  Jerman,  delighted 
rolled  off  to  fetch  the 
coffee. 

They  were  immensely 
fat  men,  Jerman  and  the 
Capitan,  but  where  the 
latter  was  firm  and  solid, 
the  former  was  soft  and 
flabby.  Neither  of  them 
was  over  fond  of  bath- 
ing, but  the  Capitan  did 
at  least  shave  regularly. 

Jerman  contented  himself  with  a  shave  when 
we  were  approaching  a  puerto,  and  then  looked 
so  startlingly  unfamiliar  that  it  gave  us  a 
feeling  of  bewilderment.  Pedroso,  I  think, 
had  possibly  never  had  a  bath  in  his  life,  except 
when  he  fell  into  the  river  years  ago,  and  was 


LIFE     ON     THE     LAUNCH.  147 

nearly  drowned.  Perhaps  the  shock  had  given 
him  a  terror  of  ablutions.  The  engineer  looked 
like  an  Italian,  was  white-skinned,  and  had  a 
mop  of  curly  black  hair  and  a  falsetto  laugh 
like  a  hyena.  He  carried  a  little  bit  of  looking- 
glass  about  with  him,  considered  himself  vastly 
superior  to  his  company,  and  only  became 
sociable  when  groups  were  to  be  photographed. 
But  all  four  men  served  us  faithfully,  and  put 
up  good-temperedly  with  our  foreign  ways. 
The  Capitan  had  seen  better  days  :  he  knew  the 
river  as  a  stage-coachman  used  to  know  the 
road.  On  him  depended  our  lives,  for  a  mistake 
in  steering  might  run  us  on  a  hidden  rock,  or 
take  us  straight  into  one  of  the  appalling 
remolinos.  He  had  been  captain  of  one  of  the 
river  steamers,  but  drank,  and  so  had  come 
down  to  taking  a  job  when  he  could  get  one. 
He  was  an  Argentine,  and  looked  like  an 
operatic  tenor,  portly  and  thick  necked,  with  a 
dark  moustache  and  heavily  lidded  dark  eyes. 
He  and  Jerman,  by  virtue  of  their  superior 
standing,  slept  on  the  space  above  the  engines, 
where  their  vast  bulks  blotted  out  the  stars  that 
otherwise  could  be  seen  through  the  glass- 
topped  sliding  door  that  shut  off  the  crew's 
quarters  from  us.  The  Capitan,  superior  man, 
shrouded  himself  under  a  mosquito  net,  but  I 
think,  beyond  this,  preparations  for  bed  did  not 
go  much  further  than  the  removal  of  boots. 
The  engineer  and  Pedroso  lowered  themselves 


148  THE    GOLDEN    RIVEK. 

at  night  down  a  trap-door,  and  slept,  mysteri- 
ously, in  the  bowels  of  the  launch,  from  whence 
came  a  steady  gutteral  snoring. 

The  Capitan  never  left  his  post  all  the  time 
we  were  steaming,  and  hour  after  hour  he 
stayed  there,  whilst  the  Lelia  picked  her  way 
daintily  through  the  maze  of  the  river.  Some- 
times we  passed  a  tiny  settlement  perched  in  a 
clearing,  and  then  she  blew  a  note  of  greeting, 
but  almost  before  the  last  sounds  of  the  whistle^ 
had  vibrated  to  silence  she  had  chugged  round 
the  next  bend  of  the  river,  and  was  lost  to  sight . 
We  sat  and  gazed  at  the  banks  ahead,  at  the 
walls  of  forest  that  neared  us,  were  swallowed 
up,  and  flung  behind  us.  All  was  fresh  and 
strange,  it  seemed  as  though  we  were  turning, 
leaf  by  leaf,  a  new  and  wonderful  picture  book. 
The  men  had  their  rifles  across  their  knees, 
ready  for  a  shot  at  the  wary  crocodiles,  who 
never  awaited  our  coming,  or  at  any  game  that 
should  stir  on  the  bank.  Once  they  fired  at  a 
huge  boar  that  showed  a  brown  flank  for  a 
moment  in  the  dense  reeds,  but  he  escaped. 
Books  and  work  lay  in  our  laps,  but  the  fascina- 
tion of  watching  the  scenery  slide  past  kept  us 
enthralled. 

When  the  sun  got  too  hot  we  had  a  siesta  in 
the  saloon,  and  at  3  o'clock  it  was  time  for  tea  : 
freshly-made  scone  bread,  cake  of  the  same, 
sweetened  with  sugar  and  flavoured  with 
shredded  peel  and  orange  juice,  innumerable 


LIFE    ON    THE    LAUNCH.  149 

cups  of  tea,  with  tinned  milk  that  poured  cheer- 
fully out  of  its  pierced  tin  into  everything  but 
the  destined  cup.  Then  a  looking  out  of  tackle 
and  writing  of  diaries,  till  it  was  nearly  five 
o'clock  and  time  to  think  of  making  a  halt. 
'  What  about  that  bank  there  ?  or  that  little 
corner  ? '  we  asked,  but  the  Capitan  was 
inexorable.  Steadily  he  kept  the  Lelia's  head 
up  stream.  'I  know  a  good  place  just  round 
the  next  bend,'  he  said,  'the  anchorage  there 
is  safe.'  And  a  quarter  of  an  hour  later  he 
swung  the  boat  round,  out  of  the  turmoil  of  the 
river,  and  after  a  little  manoeuvring  brought 
her  to,  with  her  nose  tied  to  the  bank.  The 
engines  gave  a  convulsive  snort  or  two,  then 
stopped,  and  the  quiet  of  the  forest  settled 
round  us.  The  canoe  was  hastily  got  out  for 
more  fishing,  and  my  sister  and  I  either  went 
with  it  to  be  landed  further  down,  or  wandered 
along  the  rocks  with  camera  and  sketch  book. 
This  was  the  time  when  the  sandflies  were  at 
their  worst,  and  we  wore  veils  of  close  net  that 
fitted  round  the  crown  of  our  hats  and  reached 
to  our  waist,  leaving  holes  for  the  arms,  and 
fastened  down  with  an  elastic  belt.  And  even 
then  the  sandflies  sometimes  managed  to  get 
inside.  Gauntlet  gloves  and  long  soft  boots 
up  to  our  knees  were  a  great  comfort. 

We  started  our  trip  up  the  river  on  October 
5th,  and  I  believe  it  was  a  cooler  season  than 
most.  We  had  taken  dark  linen  skirts  with  us, 


150  THE    GOLDEN     RIVER. 

cut  very  short  and  buttoning  down  back  and 
front,  and  found  them  most  useful,  worn  over 
knickers  of  the  same  material.  Long-sleeved 
shirts  that  can  be  fastened  up  to  the  throat  are 
far  the  best :  we  found  it  impossible  to  wear 
elbow  sleeves,  on  account  of  the  sandflies  and 
mosquitos.  Washing  crepe  de  chine  frocks, 
very  simply  made,  also  long-sleeved,  are  useful : 
and  a  jersey  coat  or  jumper,  to  slip  on,  is 
essential,  as  well  as  a  wrap  of  some  sort.  It  is 
quite  chilly,  sometimes,  sitting  out  on  deck,  ancf 
the  evenings  are  nearly  always  cold.  Soft  felt 
hats  keep  off  the  sun  much  better  than  straw 
ones,  and  a  sun-umbrella  is  also  necessary.  It 
is  best  to  take  very  little  luggage  :  there  is  small 
space  on  a  tiny  launch,  and  wants  are  few. 
Four  or  five  washing  shirts,  two  linen  skirts,  a 
golf  jersey  and  a  blanket  coat  for  e very-day 
use,  and  a  soft  felt  hat.  One  thin  cloth  or 
serge  coat  and  skirt,  and  a  tidy  hat.  Perhaps 
a  washing  crepe  de  chine  or  Shantung  dress. 
Underlinen  that  is  easily  washed  and  ironed. 
That  is  an  ample  outfit  for  the  river  itself.  It  is 
necessary  to  take  a  good  skin  food  and  face 
cream,  also  a  cooling  lotion,  as  the  hot  air  and 
sun  burn  and  dry  the  skin.  Personally,  I 
liked  a  little  face  cream  rubbed  in,  and  powder 
dusted  on  afterwards.  But  every  woman  has 
her  own  fancies. 

Whilst  the  men  were  fishing  we  watched  them 
from  the  shore  and  took  snapshots  of  them,  or 


LIFE    ON    THE    LAUNCH.  151 

wandered  about  looking  for  birds  and  butter- 
flies. But  the  fringe  of  ground  along  the  edge 
of  the  monte  was  very  narrow,  and  behind  that 
was  a  thorny  wall  it  was  impossible  to  get 
through,  from  which  rose  clouds  of  sand- 
flies.  Suddenly,  about  6.30,  the  sun  sank,  and 
as  suddenly  the  insects  disappeared.  The  air 
freshened,  and  throwing  back  one's  veil  one 
breathed  in  the  fragrance  of  unseen  plants  in 
the  jungle.  The  frogs  set  up  their  evening 
concert,  in  bass  and  treble,  from  the  pools 
amongst  the  tall  reeds.  Soon  it  was  time  to 
paddle  back  to  the  launch,  and  we  reached  the 
dim  form  of  the  Lelia  in  the  dusk,  our  canoe 
low  in  the  water  with  the  weight  of  freshly- 
caught  fish.  By  seven  we  were  longing  for 
dinner,  and  Jerman  had  made  us  a  soup  of 
jerked  beef  and  macaroni,  with  grated  cheese 
to  add  to  it.  Then  dorado  again,  and  bully 
beef  and  potatoes,  and  a  doubtful  kind  of  pan- 
cake of  which  he  was  inordinately  proud. 

It  got  dark  so  quickly  that  we  dined  by  the 
dim  light  of  a  paraffin  lamp,  which  flickered 
on  the  faces  round  the  table,  made  mysterious 
caverns  of  shadow  in  the  corners  of  the  room, 
and  strange  crouching  figures  of  the  coats 
hanging  on  the  walls,  and  which  woke  answer- 
ing gleams  from  the  rifle  barrels  slung  on  the 
pegs  and  from  the  slab  of  looking-glass  above 
the  improvised  dressing  table.  After  dinner 
we  put  on  wraps  and  sat  on  deck,  smoking  and 


152  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

watching  the  white  mists  gather,  or  fished  with 
hand-lines  baited  with  meat.  Sometimes  we 
sat  by  the  lamp,  writing  or  reading,  or  mending 
tackle.  And  by  9  o'clock  we  grew  sleepy.  The 
bedding  had  been  brought  in  earlier,  on  account 
of  the  evening  dew,  and  was  stacked  along  the 
benches.  Now  the  mattresses  had  to  be  put 
down  and  the  beds  made  according  to  individual 
taste.  One  could  only  sleep  if  his  bed  lay  east 
to  west,  another  must  be  near  enough  to  the 
open  door  to  pull  it  shut  if  a  storm  came  up  in- 
the  night,  a  third  demanded  to  have  her  bed  as 
far  as  possible  from  the  gangway,  that  her  face 
should  not  be  stepped  upon  by  the  unwary 
passer-by.  Hot  water  bottles  were  filled  and 
a  can  of  hot  water  put  in  the  tiny  bathroom. 
And  the  curtain  was  stretched  across  the  saloon. 
The  first  evening  it  had  consisted  of  heaped 
folds  of  rose-coloured  mosquito  netting,  till  a 
male  voice  on  the  far  side  remarked  medita- 
tively that  the  curtain  was  most  becoming,  but 
quite  transparent.  It  was  then  supplemented 
by  rugs.  Then  each  of  us  settled  cautiously 
into  bed,  lest  a  mosquito  should  creep  in  too; 
the  lamp  was  put  out,  and  a  low  murmur  of 
talk  ran  for  a  little  while  on  either  side  of  the 
room.  It  grew  more  spasmodic,  then  died 
away.  The  whisper  of  the  river  came  softly 
through  the  open  door,  and  the  gentle  slap  of 
the  water  against  the  sides  of  the  launch.  From 
below  came  the  sound  of  Pedroso's  snores. 


LIFE    ON    THE    LAUNCH.  153 

Through  the  window  one  could  watch  a  section 
of  starry  sky  swing  to  the  movement  of  the  boat, 
till  one  by  one  we  slid  over  the  edge  of  conscious- 
ness into  a  dreamless  sleep. 


CHAPTER    XVIII 

DOWNSTREAM. 

It  was  a  sad  moment  when  our  journey  down- 
stream began,  but  time  was  getting  short,  ami 
there  was  still  a  visit  to  Asuncion,  and  the 
shooting  trip  to  fit  in,  as  well  as  a  few  weeks 
at  an  estancia  in  Uruguay,  before  we  sailed  for 
England. 

We  had  been  fishing  our  way  down  the  river, 
in  leisurely  fashion,  but  meant  now  to  travel  in 
real  earnest.  We  had  dropped  down  the  river 
overnight,  to  a  sheltered  bay,  where  a  spit  of 
rocks  and  sand  thrust  itself  out  into  the  main 
rush  of  water.  Behind  that  was  calm  water, 
with  sloping  banks  of  white  sand,  and  at  this 
place  there  was  a  wider  margin  than  usual 
between  the  monte*  and  the  river.  A  small 
tributary,  with  tangled  banks,  wound  through 
the  thick  undergrowth  to  flow  into  the  bay  :  and 
very  early  that  morning  we  pushed  our  way  up 
it,  hoping  to  get  some  shooting. 

It  was  just  dawn  when  we  started.  The 
Irishman,  with  a  hunter  and  his  dog,  whom  we 
had  taken  on  board  the  night  before,  had  been 


DOWNSTREAM.  155 

landed  on  the  right  bank  of  the  small  river 
earlier  still,  and  they  meant  to  make  a  wide 
de'tour,  hoping  to  drive  any  game  there  might 
be,  down  to  the  water.  Meanwhile  our  canoe 
lay  silently,  waiting  the  chance  of  some  animal 
breaking  cover  within  range.  It  was  worse 
than  hunting  for  a  needle  in  a  haystack  :  for 
these  particular  needles  were  vigilant  and  swift- 
footed,  and  we  knew  our  chances  of  success  were 
small.  The  usual  thick  early  mists  hung  about, 
and  everything  was  filmed  with  moisture.  A 
tree-turkey  had  been  calling  in  the  wood  at  the 
mouth  of  the  river,  but  we  could  not  see  him. 
When  he  fell  silent,  there  was  not  a  sound  to 
be  heard.  Occasionally  Pedroso  dipped  a 
cautious  paddle,  to  keep  the  canoe  in  place,  and 
the  drip  of  water  from  it  seemed  startlingly 
loud.  The  river  flowed  silently,  brimmed  to 
its  muddy  banks,  and  the  ghostly  trees  huddled 
together  in  an  indistinct  mass,  from  which 
sometimes  a  branch,  black  and  flattened-looking 
in  the  fog,  thrust  itself  over  the  water. 

We  had  taken  up  our  position  where  a 
hollowed  faint  track  in  the  undergrowth  showed 
it  to  be  a  place  where  the  wild  animals  came 
down  to  drink,  and  sat  straining  our  ears  to 
catch  the  faintest  rustle.  Maidenhair  fern 
clustered  under  an  overhanging  bank,  but  there 
was  no  splash  of  colour  anywhere,  to  break  up 
the  washes  of  grey.  The  bark  of  the  dog  came 
to  us  faintly  from  the  distance,  but  nothing 


156  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

stirred  near  us.  Then  Pedroso,  in  a  low  voice, 
said,  '  Look,  look  ! '  and  we  saw  the  round  head 
of  an  otter  swimming  downstream.  Almost  as 
he  spoke  it  dived,  and  was  gone.  At  last  the 
crackling  of  the  bushes  showed  the  approach  of 
the  hunting-party  and  the  dog.  They  had  seen 
nothing,  and  had  had  great  difficulty  in  forcing 
their  way  through  the  monte*. 

We  went  back  to  the  launch  and  breakfasted, 
whilst  the  last  shreds  of  mist  cleared  off  and  thg 
sun  blazed  down  from  a  cloudless  sky.  The 
water  was  quite  deep,  and  the  Lelia  was  moored 
with  her  bows  to  the  shelving  sand.  The  Bird- 
Lover  and  I  went  off  along  the  shore,  to  make 
notes  of  different  birds,  and  we  came  back  a 
little  too  soon  for  the  success  of  a  hoax  the 
others  had  arranged  meanwhile.  Soon  after 
we  left,  they  had  seen,  in  the  bay,  the  two  points 
almost  level  with  the  water  that  meant  a 
crocodile,  and  the  Irishman  had  fired  twice, 
and  wounded  it.  Then  he  and  Pedroso  dashed 
off  in  the  canoe  to  where  it  was  trying  to  escape, 
threshing  the  water  to  foam  in  its  struggles. 
Another  bullet  or  two  still  did  not  finish  it  off, 
and  so,  manoeuvring  the  canoe  close  alongside, 
they  gaffed  it,  and  with  the  greatest  difficulty  got 
a  rope  round  it  and  hoisted  it  on  board.  Then 
they  proceeded  to  arrange  it  beautifully,  with 
open  jaws,  just  where  we  should  be  stepping 
into  the  launch.  But  unfortunately  we  came 
round  the  corner  too  soon,  whilst  they  were 


DOWNSTREAM.  157 

washing  it  and  fixing  it  up  into  position.  It 
was  not  a  very  large  one,  eight  feet  in  length, 
but  a  startling  thing  to  come  on,  suddenly.  The 
men  began  skinning  it,  but  at  the  first  cut  the 
supposedly-dead  beast  began  to  wriggle  and  to 
lash  its  tail,  though  it  had  already  had  the 
contents  of  a  revolver  emptied  into  its  head. 
At  last  it  was  really  killed,  and  its  skin  was 
peeled  oft',  like  a  glove  from  a  hand.  The  sun 
was  getting  very  hot,  and  the  sand  almost  burnt 
one's  feet.  Innumerable  yellow  butterflies, 
attracted  by  the  puddles  of  blood  that  had 
soaked  into  it,  fluttered  about,  settling  on  the 
stains,  till  these  were  quite  hidden  by  a  quiver- 
ing drift  of  orange  and  gold.  The  crocodile's 
skin  was  treated  with  disinfectants  and  put  on 
the  roof  of  the  launch,  the  carcase  rolled  into 
the  river  for  the  fish  to  devour;  and  then  we 
went  on  board  and  started  down  the  river, 
leaving  the  yellow  butterflies  in  possession. 

We  sped  downstream  at  a  great  rate,  turning 
unwilling  backs  on  the  far  reaches  we  had 
longed  to  explore.  We  had  seen  the  great  Falls 
of  Iguazii  and  of  Guayra,  but  we  ached  to 
explore  the  river  still  further  north,  making 
Guayra  our  starting-point,  and  wandering  far 
into  the  unknown,  where  hardly  a  traveller  has 
ever  been.  Coming  back  is  always  rather  a 
depressing  thing :  however  successful  the 
journey  has  been,  the  sense  of  elation  and 
adventure  is  over.  One  more  memory  is  added, 


158  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

it  is  true,  to  one's  'scented  hoard';  but  the 
attained  has  moved  out  of  that  shimmering 
mirage  of  the  places  that  are  yet  waiting  to  be 
seen.  Fortunately,  the  Pied  Piper  of  the 
wilderness  holds  enough  magic  in  his  music  to 
last  a  lifetime;  and  the  world  is  wide. 

The  river  had  fallen  tremendously  since  our 
upstream  journey,  and  a  broad  strip  of  glisten- 
ing black  rocks  now  showed,  where  the  monte' 
had  previously  come  down  right  to  the  water*£ 
edge.  One  by  one  we  passed  the  well-known 
landmarks,  whilst  we,  with  the  river,  hurried 
further  and  further  from  the  strange,  beautiful 
scenery  upstream,  to  the  wider  stretches  of 
water  lower  down  :  till  at  last  the  little  town  of 
Posadas  showed  low  on  the  horizon,  pricked 
with  the  pencil  points  of  masts  and  shipping  in 
the  harbour. 

The  crocodile  skin  was  brought  to  our  hotel 
with  the  rest  of  our  luggage,  but  stayed  down- 
stairs with  the  heavier  baggage.  And  then  it 
was  that  the  crocodile  avenged  his  death.  The 
weather  was  hot,  and  little  by  little  an 
unpleasant  smell  began  to  be  noticed.  Intending 
visitors  arriving  at  the  hotel  sniffed  critically 
in  the  hall :  there  was  dark  talk  of  defective 
drains.  We,  on  the  upper  storey,  were  ignorant 
of  the  turn  of  events  :  till  finally  the  worried 
proprietor  tracked  the  smell  to  its  source,  and 
came  to  say  we  must  at  once  remove  the  skin. 
The  thought  of  losing  his  beloved  crocodile  was 


DOWNSTREAM.  159 

terrible  to  the  Irishman,  whose  protests  as  to 
the  lashings  of  disinfectants  he  had  used  were 
swept  aside.  It  was  now  a  question  of  where 
on  earth  to  put  it,  till  the  shooting  trip  was 
over  and  it  could  be  retrieved.  Then  it  struck 
us  that  perhaps  Jerman,  whose  home  was  in 
Posadas,  might  not  object  to  giving  it 
shelter.  '  Why  not  ? '  he  said  cheerfully, 
when  approached  on  the  subject,  and  went  off 
humming,  with  it  over  his  shoulder,  the  skin 
cleaving  a  ready  way  for  him  down  the  street. 
More  than  likely,  another  smell  or  two  made 
little  difference  in  the  atmosphere  of  Jerman 's 
house. 

It  was  from  Posadas,  a  few  days  later,  that 
we  started  by  train  for  Asuncion,  the  capital  of 
Paraguay.  Our  railway  carriage  was  hitched 
on  to  the  mail  train,  and  we  crossed  the  Parana 
early  in  the  morning  by  ferry,  in  two  sections, 
and  landed  in  Paraguay,  where  we  started 
afresh  on  another  line.  It  was  warm  and 
pleasant  sitting  out  at  the  back  of  our  carriage, 
watching  everything  we  passed.  It  is  a 
beautiful  country  of  open  grass  spaces,  and 
groups  of  trees,  reminiscent  of  private  parks 
in  England.  Oranges  everywhere,  each  tiny 
rancho  being  surrounded  by  trees,  and  little 
patches  of  maize  and  tobacco.  Wild  flowers 
grew  in  profusion,  and  bushes  of  the  scented 
Paraguayan  jasmine,  with  its  two  coloured 
flowers  of  blue  and  mauve.  For  the  most  part 


1GO  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

the  country  we  passed  through  was  a  rolling 
plain,  but  now  and  again  a  sudden  pointed  hill 
or  range  stood  up  out  of  it.  We  came  to  a  few 
small  towns,  but  generally  the  stations  were  just 
dumped  down  at  far  intervals.  The  people 
always  collected  to  watch  the  arrival  of  the 
train,  the  horses  tied  to  a  fence,  with  that  air  of 
quiet  resignation  typical  of  the  Paraguayans 
themselves.  Women  went  up  and  down  the 
platforms,  in  fresh  print  dresses,  selling  cigar& 
eggs,  and  oranges :  and  when  everyone  had 
quite  finished  making  his  purchases  the  obliging 
train  started  again.  Its  arrival  was  something 
of  an  event,  as  the  up  train  only  ran  three  days 
a  week,  and  the  down  train  the  other  days,  I 
believe. 

On  reaching  Encarnacion  we  heard  that  a 
revolution  had  broken  out  in  the  capital,  but 
we  decided  not  to  turn  back.  All  day  we 
wandered  across  the  level  country,  watching  its 
wide  stretches,  with  a  handful  of  poor  long- 
horned  cattle  feeding  on  it,  the  tiny  huts  with 
their  poultry  pecking  round  the  doors,  and  the 
barefooted,  brown-skinned  children.  A  poor 
and  beautiful  land,  needing  money  to  develop 
its  possibilities.  Late  in  the  evening  we 
reached  Asuncion,  and  found  the  station 
guarded  by  police.  The  revolution  was  in  full 
swing,  we  were  told,  but  it  seemed  of  a  mild 
brand.  We  lived  in  our  railway  compartment 
in  the  station,  and  wandered  about  the  little 


DOWNSTREAM. 


161 


town  in  the  daytime,  only  taking  care  to  be  back 
at  our  quarters  before  dark.  The  town  was  in 
the  hands  of  the  barefooted  police,  and  as  many 

of  them  could  only 
talk  Guarani,  one  ran 
some  risk  of  being  shot 
whilst  explaining  one's 
inoffensiveness  in  care- 
ful Spanish. 

The  little  straggling 
town  is  rather  charm- 
ing,  built  on  a  slope 
overlooking       the 
wide  stretches  of 
the    river    Para- 
guay ;    there    are 
few    large    buildings, 
and  avenues  of  orange 
trees  border  the  tram 
lines.     The  houses  on 
the    outskirts    of    the 
town  stand  in  beauti- 
ful gardens  of  palms 
and  trees  covered  with 


\ 


brilliant  flowers.  The 
roads  are  very  red  in 
colour,  and  are  less 
like  roads  than  the 

dry  beds  of  mountain  torrents.  They  are 
seamed  with  crevasses,  and  tilted  at  all  angles. 
But  it  doesn't  seem  to  matter  much  in  Asuncion. 


162  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

Why  be  in  a  hurry  ?  The  sun  is  hot,  and  fruit 
and  tobacco  are  plentiful.  Everyone,  both  men 
and  women,  smoke  cigars  and  always  have  one 
in  their  mouths.  I  conclude  the  girls  remove 
them  before  being  kissed,  but  I  had  no  oppor- 
tunity of  finding  out.  The  market  was  full  of 
fruit  and  vegetables,  parrots  and  macaws,  and 
many  birds  strange  to  us.  We  explored  the 
cobbled  streets  of  the  town  thoroughly,  saw  the 
unfinished  red  cathedral  that  Lopez  built  for 
his  intended  coronation;  drove  out  into  the 
country  round,  clinging  precariously  to  our 
seats,  and  shuddering  at  the  huge  nets  of 
spiders  that  clung  to  every  telegraph  post.  The 
spiders  seem  to  live  in  colonies,  in  great  cocoons, 
moored  to  the  posts  with  thick  cables  of  web. 
At  dusk  they  wake  to  a  horrible  activity,  prey- 
ing on  the  moths  and  insects  attracted  by  the 
lamps. 

We  were  sorry  when  the  time  came  to  leave 
this  picturesque  country  :  but  the  men  of  our 
party  were  going  for  a  shooting  expedition  into 
the  Chaco,  and  we  had  decided  to  go  back  to 
Montevideo  and  wait  for  them  at  the  estancia, 
making  our  way  back  to  Posadas  and  so  to 
Concordia,  where  we  should  cross  the  river 
Uruguay  to  Salto,  and  thence  a  night's  journey 
to  Montevideo. 


CHAPTER    XIX. 

THE  CHACO. 

If  you  look  at  the  map  you  will  see  that  the 
Paraguay  River,  flowing  from  north  to  south, 
cuts  the  Republic  of  the  same  name  in  two.  All 
through  the  history  of  that  beautiful  country, 
one  of  the  most  tragic  and  poignant  of  human 
stories,  that  river  has  formed  an  untraversed 
boundary,  dividing  the  territory  on  the  west  of 
it  from  that  on  the  east.  These  two  differ 
absolutely  :  in  geography,  in  climate,  in  history 
and  in  race.  The  Jesuits,  who  ruled  Paraguay 
under  a  marvellous  theocracy  for  two  hundred 
years,  and  with  all  their  faults  gave  it  a  greater 
measure  of  human  happiness  than  it  has  known 
before  or  since,  never  got  over  the  Paraguay 
River,  and  the  land  to  the  west  of  it,  the  Chaco, 
remained  uncivilised  and  unconverted.  So,  in 
effect,  it  remains  to-day.  Inhabited  by  savage 
tribes,  subject  to  periodic  floods,  holding  no 
minerals  to  lure  the  prospector  and  little  game 
to  tempt  the  hunter,  the  rush  of  civilisation  has 
passed  it  by,  and  large  portions  of  it  are  even 


164  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

to-day  totally  unknown.  It  is  a  vast  plain, 
El  Gran  Chaco,  partly  in  the  Argentine 
Republic,  partly  in  Paraguay,  partly  in 
Bolivia.  It  has  been  formed  through  the 
centuries  by  the  silt  brought  down  by  many 
great  rivers  which,  rising  on  the  eastern  foot- 
hills of  the  Andes,  flow  east  and  fall  into  the 
Paraguay  River.  That  part  of  It  which  lies 
in  the  State  of  Paraguay,  the  Paraguayan 
Chaco,  is  flat,  open  country  with  patches  of 
wood  and  scrub,  covered  with  coarse  grass, 
marshy,  studded  with  palm  groves,  haunted  by 
every  known  stinging  insect  and  by  innumerable 
birds.  It  is  wandered  over  by  nomad  tribes, 
some  still  living  in  the  stone  age,  many  of 
them  fierce  and  almost  unknown.  They  differ 
entirely,  in  race  and  disposition,  from  the 
pleasant  and  easy-going  Guaranis,  who  form 
the  bulk  of  the  population  of  Paraguay  proper  : 
and  it  is  only  on  the  edges,  along  the 
River  Paraguay  and  its  tributaries,  that  the 
missionary  or  the  trader  have  made  any  inroad. 
This  book  recounts  no  heroic  exploits,  and 
it  was  only  to  a  corner,  more  or  less  civilised, 
that  our  travels  extended.  We  went  there  for 
game.  Game  was  not  there,  though  clearly  it 
had  been  there  not  so  very  long  before,  for  there 
were  numberless  tracks.  So  far,  therefore,  as 
game  was  concerned,  the  expedition  was  a 
failure ;  we  shot  enough  to  eat  and  that  was  all : 
but  I  would  not  have  missed  it  for  the  world, 


THE    CHACO.  165 

for   I   saw   what   must   be   one   of   the   most 
interesting    countries    existing. 

Our  plan  was  as  follows.  We  were  to  start 
from  Asuncion,  the  capital  of  Paraguay,  and 
go  in  a  petrol  launch  two  days'  journey  up  the 
Pilcomayo,  one  of  the  large  rivers  which  rises 
in  the  Andes  and  flows  into  the  Paraguay  from 
the  west.  Here  we  should  reach  the  little 
puerto  of  Galileo,  from  which  a  narrow  gauge 
railway  track,  now  disused,  ran  some  forty 
kilometres  north  into  the  Chaco.  At  Galileo 
we  were  to  get  hold  of  a  trolley — there  was  no 
other  rolling  stock — put  our  rifles  and  kit  on  it, 
and  get  a  couple  of  peons  to  push  us  up  to  rail- 
head, where  we  would  make  our  headquarters 
and  starting  point.  Big  game  shooting  in 
South  America  is  notoriously  bad,  but  this,  in 
the  opinion  of  those  who  knew,  was  the  best 
place  we  could  go  to.  It  had  never  failed 
before.  It  failed  through  no  fault  of  the  kind 
friends  who  took  so  much  trouble  to  send  us 
there.  It  failed  because,  as  we  heard  after  we 
had  been  some  time  there,  the  roving  Indians 
had  been  there  a  few  months  before  and  killed 
off  everything.  Consequently  we,  a  party  of 
three  with  two  guides,  only  got  three  head  of 
game  in  a  fortnight,  one  stag,  one  peccary  and 
one  gato  onza — the  tiger  cat  or  ocelot,  that 
beautiful  miniature  of  the  jaguar.  Indeed, 
except  for  birds,  of  which  there  were  many  and 
which  we  shot  to  eat,  we  never  got  a  shot  at 


166  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

anything  else.  But  I  do  not  think  any  of 
us  regards  the  expedition  as  a  failure. 

We  made  our  journey  as  planned,  with  one 
exception.  To  pull  the  trolley,  instead  of 
peons  we  got  a  mule.  You  never  saw  a  more 
amiable,  industrious  and  adaptable  animal. 
With  the  hunter  on  his  back,  and  with  one  end 
of  a  raw-hide  rope  tied  to  his  saddle  and  the 
other  to  the  trolley,  he  pulled  that  trolley, 
containing  our  provisions,  our  kit,  our  rifles 
and  very  often  ourselves,  up  those  forty  kilo- 
metres and  back  without  a  hesitation  or  a 
stumble,  now  swimming  a  river  with  the  docility 
of  a  dog,  now  wading  through  marsh  up  to  his 
hocks  and  now  tripping  delicately  over  the 
rotten  remains  of  what  once  were  sleepers.  He 
was  a  remarkable  animal. 

It  was  a  hot  afternoon  when  we  started  in 
the  launch.  The  Pilcomayo  runs  into  the 
Paraguay  just  opposite  Asuncion.  It  is  a 
curious  river :  it  must  be  not  far  from  a 
thousand  miles  long  and  yet  it  is  no  bigger  than 
the  Thames  at  Oxford.  Coming  as  we  did  from 
the  broad,  rocky,  clear-flowing  Parana,  the 
Pilcomayo  was  a  strange  contrast.  It  corre- 
sponded more  nearly  to  my  idea  of  a  tropical 
river.  It  was  slow  and  turgid,  full  of  sunken 
trees,  with  mysterious  swampy  backwaters 
where  the  water  stood  several  feet  up  the  trunks, 
and  unknown  river  plants  grew.  The  banks 
were  neither  so  high  nor  so  thick  as  those  of  the 


•5-  I  HR*  • 


THE     CHACO.  167 

Parana,  and  when  you  got  through  the  trees 
which  fringed  them  you  found  open  park-like 
country. 

The  features  which  strike  you  in  the  Chaco 
are  its  flatness,  and  the  wonderful  way  in  which 
wood  and  plain  are  mixed  together.  The 
country  looks  as  though  it  had  been  planted. 
You  get  woods  of  all  sizes,  from  forests  several 
miles  long,  down  to  little  spinneys,  not  fifty 
yards  across,  from  which  you  half  expect  to 
see  a  pheasant  or  a  rabbit  emerge.  What  adds 
to  their  artificial  appearance  is  that  the  woods 
end  abruptly,  and  do  not  merge  gradually  into 
the  plain.  On  the  edge  of  them  and  scattered 
over  the  plains,  giving  its  distinct  character  to 
the  district,  are  the  palm  groves.  The  tops  of 
the  palms  are  green,  but  the  dead  lower  leaves 
do  not  fall  off,  and  hang  down,  withered 
and  yellow,  giving  the  landscape  a  sun-dried 
tropical  appearance.  On  the  other  hand,  the 
plain,  with  its  bright  green  grass,  studded  with 
innumerable  flowers,  with  a  brave  south  wind 
blowing  over  it,  and  with  patches  of  water  and 
reeds,  seems  to  belong  to  the  temperate  regions. 
It  is  this  contrast  which  sticks  in  the  memory. 
You  look  across  a  couple  of  miles  of  what  might 
be  an  English  hayfield,  covered  with  yellow 
flowers  which  might  be  English  buttercups,  with 
a  light  wind  sweeping  and  shaking  them,  and 
at  the  far  side  are  tropical  palms,  first  a  few 
standing  out,  then  a  regular  grove,  with  their 


168  THE    GOLDEN     RIVER. 

unfamiliar  green  tops  and  parched  lower  leaves, 
and  beyond  them  again  the  dark  line  of  the 
forest. 

There  is  an  air  of  freshness  and  new  growth, 
and  yet  you  know  you  are  in  a  hot  country. 
That  fact  cannot  escape  you.  It  is  hot :  very 
hot  indeed.  You  wear  as  little  as  possible; 
but  your  rifle  weighs  a  ton,  its  sling  burns  your 
shoulder  and  you  wish  you  had  left  your  glasses 
behind.  It  is  early  noon,  and  the  sun  is 
straight  overhead.  You  have  been  up  since" 
four,  hunting  the  edges  of  the  monte"  to  try  to 
find  a  deer  feeding  at  dawn.  You  have  not  had 
a  shot  except  a  two  hundred  and  fifty  yards 
crack  at  a  galloping  ostrich  (the  South 
American  ostrich,  the  rhea)  on  which  you 
naturally  made  no  impression  whatever.  You 
have  worked  hard;  but  the  immense  stock  of 
enthusiasm  with  which  you  started  has  slowly 
evaporated.  A  short  time  before,  as  you  were 
walking  quietly  in  a  lovely  glade  in  the  monte*, 
your  companion  stopped,  laid  his  hand  on  your 
arm,  and  looked  intently.  You  look,  but  see 
nothing.  There,  there,  he  whispers,  behind 
that  myrtle.  You  can  still  see  nothing.  Then 
there  is  a  patter  of  leaves,  and  the  dogs,  more 
intelligent  than  you,  rush  in,  and  your  one 
chance  vanishes.  Your  companion  tells  you 
that  one  of  the  pretty  little  deer  of  the  country 
has  stood  looking  at  you  full  twenty  seconds, 
not  twenty  yards  off;  and  you  curse  yourself 


THE    CHACO.  169 

for    a    maladroit    fool    who    ought    never    to 
leave  towns. 

Well,  the  day  is  over  now  till  the  evening; 
you  had  better  get  back  to  camp  and  get  some- 
thing to  eat.  So  back  you  trudge  in  the  blinding 
heat,  and  round  you  all  these  long  miles  are 
mosquitoes  and  horseflies  and  numberless  other 
virulent  insects  in  swarms,  and  every  exposed 
part  of  you  is  bitten  and  bitten  and  bitten 
again,  until  the  one  thing  you  long  for  is  to 
reach  the  camp  fire,  pile  it  with  green  boughs, 
and  sit  in  the  heavy  spicy  smoke  which  no 
mosquito  can  penetrate.  All  things  end  at 
last :  and  at  last  you  do  get  back  and  do  as  you 
meant  to  do.  And  then  when  you  have  eaten 
and  drunk  and  smoked,  a  great  peace  comes 
over  you.  The  troubles  of  the  morning  recede  : 
and  whereas  a  couple  of  hours  before  you  could 
have  sworn  that  nothing  would  get  you  away 
from  camp  again  that  day,  you  already  begin 
to  debate  where  you  will  go  in  the  evening 
Shall  it  be  along  the  river,  with  its  miles  of 
reeds,  where  you  saw  the  fresh  tapir  tracks? 
Or  shall  you  go  to  that  likely  looking  country 
to  the  east,  and  try  to  catch  a  deer  at  his  even- 
ing feed  ?  Or  shall  you  merely  take  a  shot  gun, 
and  Atto,  the  half-bred  pointer  who  does  not 
point,  and  shoot  some  duck,  teal  or  partridges 
for  the  pot  ?  Something  at  any  rate  you  mean 
to  do :  you  will  not  stay  in  camp  :  and  you  lie 
on  your  hammock,  lazily  watching  the  sun 


170  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

through  the  leaves,  in  pleasant  expectation  of 
his  getting  low  enough  to  enable  you  to  start. 
And  then,  when  you  come  back  at  sunset, 
how  pleasant  is  the  night.  The  gallant  south 
wind  which  has  blown  all  day  has  dropped. 
The  air  is  still.  At  sundown  day  suddenly 
turns  over  to  night,  and  a  divine  coolness 
spreads  over  everything :  the  fire  becomes 
agreeable;  and  you,  who  sweltered  through  the 
day  clad  only  in  a  shirt  and  trousers,  will  Be 
glad  of  a  second  blanket  to-night.  You  wake 
up,  perhaps,  to  pull  it  on.  One  naturally 
wakes  up  between  twelve  and  two,  when  sleep- 
ing in  the  open  air.  You  get  up,  put  a  log  or 
two  on  the  fire,  and  look  round.  The  moon 
makes  everything  as  bright  as  day.  The  forest 
is  full  of  mysterious  noises.  It  has  awakened  : 
this  is  its  day,  its  living  time,  its  period  of  food 
and  drink,  of  business  and  pleasure :  not  the 
hot,  barren  sunlight  when  sensible  creatures 
sleep.  There  is  movement  and  sound  all  round 
you :  distant  calls  and  cries,  bodies  moving 
through  the  boughs,  little  feet  pattering  over 
the  dead  leaves.  Hot  scents  rise  from  the 
earth.  The  tired  dogs  have  got  into  the  ashes 
and  are  lying,  heads  in  paws,  trying  to  escape 
the  merciless  mosquitoes.  And  you,  too,  you 
had  better  get  back  under  your  mosquito  net. 
And,  let  me  warn  you,  do  not  leave  a  chink  or 
crevice  of  it  open,  or  you  will  be  invaded  by 
their  triumphant  hordes. 


THE     CHACO.  171 

The  impressions  of  the  Chaco  which  remain 
are  its  bright  beauty,  its  mixture  of  wood  and 
plain,  its  palm  trees,  its  birds,  and  its  flatness. 
It  is  absolutely  dead  level.  True,  when  you  go 
into  the  patches  of  monte*  you  see  that  they  are 
a  little,  very  little,  higher  than  the  campo.  It 
is  so  little  that  it  does  nothing  to  break  the 
general  uniformity;  but  it  is  just  this  little 
which  causes  their  existence,  and  makes  such 
a  sharp  division  between  them  and  the  campo. 
So  flat  is  the  Chaco,  that  most  of  it  is  a  marsh 
in  the  wet  season.  When  we  got  there  the 
water  was  drying  up,  and  large  tracts,  where 
when  we  first  went  the  water  and  mud  was 
nearly  up  to  the  knee,  were  hard  and  dry  before 
we  left.  The  walking  is  easy  :  the  grass  is 
long,  but  usually  not  tussocky,  and  the  ground 
is  firm  and  clean.  Even  in  the  wet  parts  you 
do  not  sink  deep,  and  a  good  pair  of  field  boots 
will  see  you  through.  But  I  am  talking  only  of 
the  dry  season  of  a  dry  year.  It  must  be  very 
different  in  the  wet.  And,  besides  these 
changes  of  season,  the  Chaco  is  subject  to 
periodic  floodings,  the  causes  of  which  are  not 
distinctly  known,  which  recur  in  cycles.  Then 
all  the  year  the  water  stands  on  the  flat  plain, 
and  it  becomes  one  great  marsh,  where  the 
stork,  the  egret,  the  ibis,  the  heron,  and  every 
bird  long  of  leg  :  the  goose,  the  duck  and  all  the 
tribe  of  swimmers  :  and  those  strange  marsh 
birds  which  trip  with  immense  feet  lightly  and 


172  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

surely  over  the  light  water  leaves :  all  these 
congregate  in  their  thousands,  and  take  their 
pleasure  at  their  ease,  careless  of  man. 


IN    THE    CHACO. 


CAMP    IN    THE    CHACO. 


CHAPTER    XX. 

THE    BIRDS. 

As  this  book  is  not  written  to  instruct,  it  will 
not  give  ornithological  information.  There  is 
here  nothing  new  :  my  knowledge  of  birds  is 
slight  and  empirical,  and  no  doubt  I  missed 
much  which  would  have  been  obvious  to  a  skilled 
observer.  But,  loving  birds  dearly,  having  all 
my  life  looked  at  them,  and  having  just  come 
from  one  of  the  most  remarkable  bird  districts 
of  the  world,  I  want  to  show  what  a  vast  amount 
of  pleasure  you  can  get  out  of  birds  without  any 
deep  scientific  knowledge.  You  do  not  need 
Latin  names,  and  you  will  find  none  here  :  you 
need  not  know  technical  terms :  all  that  you 
require  is  a  pair  of  glasses,  a  book  of  reference 
and  love  of  your  subject.  Oddly  enough  a  book 
of  reference  is  hard  to  get.  There  is  no  book 
on  the  birds  of  Paraguay  since  one  written  by 
a  Jesuit  father  in  the  eighteenth  century.  The 
best  book  to  use  is  Argentine  Ornithology, 
published  in  1888  by  Mr.  W.  H.  Hudson  in 
collaboration  with  that  great  ornithologist,  the 
late  Philip  Lutley  Sclater.  But,  unfortunately, 


174  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

that  book  is  long  out  of  print  and  prohibitive 
in  price  :  and  its  only  successor  is  Mr.  W.  H. 
Hudson's  Birds  of  La  Plata,  two  volumes,  1920. 
which  represents  his  own  contribution  to  A  r gen- 
tine  Ornithology  revised  and  brought  up  to  date, 
and  is  easy  to  get  and  not  dear.  But  it  has  two 
drawbacks  for  the  traveller  to  Paraguay  and 
Southern  Brazil.  It  only  professes  to  give  the 
birds  of  La  Plata,  a  long  way  off  to  the  south, 
and  thus  leaves  out  many  Paraguay  birds, 
and  it  is  also  limited  to  birds  Mr.  Hudson  has 
seen  himself ;  for,  as  he  tells  us  in  his  Preface, 
he  has  'thrown  out'  all  Sclater's  work,  which 
comprised  the  descriptions  of  birds  unknown  to 
Mr.  Hudson.  This  renders  the  book  much  less 
use  than  it  might  have  been  to  the  ignorant  and 
perplexed  student;  for  no  doubt  many  of  the 
birds  I  could  not  identify  in  Paraguay  or  Brazil 
were  contained  in  the  rejected  chapters.  For 
these  chapters  doubtless  describe  many  tropical 
forms  found  in  the  northern  Argentine  but 
absent  from  La  Plata  :  and  these  were  the  very 
birds  I  wanted.  However,  in  spite  of  these 
drawbacks,  the  book  was  invaluable.  I  should 
have  been  lost  without  it.  And,  let  me  add, 
what  every  naturalist  knows,  that  there  is 
an  immense  amount  of  information  in  Mr. 
Hudson's  earlier  books.  No  one  interested  in 
nature  should  go  to  South  America  without 
reading  A  Naturalist  in  La  Plata,  the  Purple 
Land,  and  Far  Away  and  Long  Ago.  For 


THE    BIRDS.  175 

myself  I  am  glad  to  have  a  chance  of  repaying 
part  of  the  debt  I  have  long  owed  to  this  fine 
observer  and  beautiful  writer.  The  names  of 
birds  in  what  follows  are  taken  from  his  Birds 
of  La  Plata,  or  they  are  the  common  names  of 
the  country. 

As  you  go  up  the  Alto-Parana,  certain  birds 
are  so  common  that  you  can  hardly  look  out 
without  seeing  them.  One  is  the  Little  Blue 
Heron.  He  is  a  miniature  of  our  heron,  less 
than  half  the  size,  and  duller  in  colouring.  He 
lives  low  down,  sitting  on  a  branch  overhanging 
the  water.  As  the  launch  comes  up  he  flies  off, 
his  wings  flapping  in  steady  heron  fashion,  and 
goes  perfectly  straight  away  a  foot  above  the 
water  and  three  or  four  yards  from  the  bank, 
not  deviating  an  inch.  When  he  has  made  a 
hundred  yards  or  so,  he  will  suddenly  turn  in 
to  the  bank,  and  sit  looking  at  you,  not  moving 
a  feather :  and  then  when  the  noisy  launch 
comes  near,  off  he  flies  again.  The  process  is 
repeated  two  or  three  times,  until  either  he  gets 
tired  or  comes  to  the  conclusion  that  the  launch 
is  more  unpleasant  than  dangerous;  this  time 
he  sits  quite  motionless  looking  at  you,  and  "will 
let  the  launch  pass  within  a  few  yards. 

A  very  handsome  cousin  of  his  lives  in  Para- 
guay, the  Little  Red  Heron,  with  his  fashion- 
able jacket  of  rusty  orange,  and  his  yellow  beak 
He  was  chiefly  seen  perching  in  trees,  where  he 
looked  as  delightfully  out  of  place  as  all  the 


176  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

heron  family  do.  And  there  was  another  lovely 
bird  of  the  same  family  of  whom  I  know 
nothing  but  the  Spanish  name,  Mirasol.  I  saw 
two,  one,  poor  wretch,  in  a  small  cage  in  a  bird 
shop  at  Asuncion,  and  the  other  wild  in  the 
Chaco.  He  is  a  good  deal  bigger,  standing  two 
foot  high,  very  straight  and  stiff.  His  back  is 
pearl  grey,  his  underparts  pure  lemon,  his  eye 
is  brown  with  a  blue  ring  round  it,  and  his  bill 
is  coral  tipped  with  brown.  The  effect  of  the 
blue  ring  round  the  eye  and  the  red  bill  is 
remarkable. 

But  to  return  to  the  Alto-Parana.  Another 
common  and  conspicuous  bird  is  the  White 
Kite.  When  I  first  saw  him,  I  thought  he  was 
a  tern.  He  looks  like  one  in  colour,  his  flight  is 
the  same,  he  has  the  same  way  of  poising  him- 
self in  the  air,  and  he  goes  about  in  parties  of 
four  or  five  together.  He  is  a  pale  grey  above, 
black  on  the  wings  and  pure  white  below.  I 
have  never  seen  a  bird  with  such  power  of  wing. 
I  never  saw  one  perching.  They  were  always  in 
the  air,  delighting  in  their  skill,  now  soaring, 
now  swooping  suddenly  with  incredible  speed 
and  grace,  now  almost  stationary  and  now 
again  rising  and  falling  in  the  wind.  And  all 
this  is  done  not  for  catching  their  food,  or 
getting  from  place  to  place,  or  any  other  object 
but  that  of  beautiful  movement.  It  is  the  pure 
joy  of  motion.  The  air  is  their  playground,  in 
all  its  breadth  and  height. 


THE    BIRDS.  177 

Among  the  mental  pictures  of  the  Alto- 
Parana  not  the  least  permanent  will  be  one  of 
sitting  in  the  bows  of  the  launch,  a  hot  sun 
beating  on  the  old  sail  which  serves  as  awning 
but  a  cool  breeze  flowing  from  the  movement 
of  the  boat,  eating  the  good  oranges  of  Para- 
guay, and  watching  the  agate  water  slip  past ; 
whilst  there  is  a  Little  Blue  Heron  flapping 
unhurriedly  in  a  bee-line  up  the  bank;  White 
Kites  swinging  in  the  air  or  sweeping  in  a 
mighty  curve  over  the  tree- tops;  a  kingfisher, 
bigger  than  our  jay,  with  a  blue-grey  coat  and 
orange  waistcoat,  sitting  on  a  dead  bough;  and 
across  the  burnished  surface  of  the  river  pass 
and  repass  the  tireless  swallows,  with  light 
bodies  and  a  broad  azure  band  round  their 
shoulders,  like  a  belt  of  turquoise. 

It  is  always  exciting  to  see  wild  those  birds 
which  you  have  only  known  in  cages,  and  the 
first  sight  of  parrots  is  thrilling.  But  the 
thrill  is  nothing  compared  with  the  first  sight 
of  a  macaw.  You  have  to  go  north  to  find  them. 
When  we  had  passed  the  mouth  of  the  Iguazii. 
and  were  steaming  up  to  Puerto  Mendez,  Brazil 
on  the  right  hand  and  Paraguay  on  the  left, 
our  captain  told  us  that  in  the  afternoon  we 
should  reach  a  certain  tree  where  there  would 
be  macaws.  The  tree  you  see  a  long  way  off, 
standing  out  half-way  up  the  cliff,  thick  and 
heavy,  something  like  our  sycamore.  I  got  my 
glasses  on  to  it,  and  there  sure  enough  were  two 


178  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

red  and  blue  macaws,  conspicuous  against  the 
green  leaves,  looking  for  all  the  world  like 
immense  artificial  flowers.  Even  there,  on  the 
edge  of  the  tropic,  they  looked  too  brilliant  to 
be  natural.  After  that,  as  you  went  north, 
they  were  common,  always  in  pairs.  At  the 
Falls  of  Guayra,  surely  one  of  the  most 
stupendous  sights  of  the  world,  where  you  have 
to  wade  out  to  one  of  the  subsidiary  falls  to  see 
the  great  Parana  river  hurl  itself  through  a 
narrow  gorge,  macaws  kept  flying  overhead, 
back  and  forward,  two  and  two,  visiting  a  rocky 
island  which  stands  in  the  middle  of  the  falls, 
looking  with  their  long  tails  not  unlike 
pheasants. 

Some  part  of  our  time  on  the  Chaco  had  to 
be  spent  in  getting  birds  for  food.  There  were 
plenty.  The  birds  had  started  laying,  and 
naturally  we  shot  no  more  than  we  required; 
but  some  we  had  to  shoot.  It  may  seem 
barbarous,  but  you  have  to  do  it  in  a  wild 
country.  Next  to  the  bird  called  the  pheasant, 
to  be  described  later,  our  great  stand-by  was  the 
partridge,  big  and  small.  The  South  American 
partridge  is  the  tinamou,  the  common  or  small 
partridge  being  the  Spotted  Tinamou,  and 
the  big  or  red-winged  partridge  the  Rufous 
Tinamou.  The  small  partridge,  on  the  wing, 
is  exactly  like  ours,  except  that  it  is  a  fraction 
smaller  and  makes  if  possible  more  fuss  and 
pother  and  clatter  when  it  gets  up.  The  big 


THE     BIRDS.  179 

partridge  gets  up  more  slowly  and  flies  higher. 
The  big  partridge  abounded,  and,  with  a  dog, 
we  could  always  get  the  four  or  five  we  wanted. 

In  Uruguay  the  small  partridge  has  always 
been  common,  and  now  that  grain  growing  is 
spreading  the  big  partridge,  formerly  rare,  is 
increasing.  The  small  partridge  is  very 
numerous.  In  an  estancia  on  which  I  stayed 
in  that  country  three  hundred  brace  have  been 
shot  by  four  guns  in  a  short  day.  I  was  there 
in  the  nesting  season,  when  of  course  they  were 
protected,  but  you  put  them  up  in  quantities  as 
you  rode  over  the  campo.  The  eggs  of  the 
partridges  are  of  a  rare  and  lovely  colour  :  they 
are  quite  plain,  of  the  tint  of  old  claret  or  of 
the  darker  ground  of  an  Aubusson  carpet.  They 
fade,  however,  rapidly,  and  become  dull  brown 
in  colour. 

Next  to  the  partridge  come  the  duck.  The 
'pato  reale,'  the  Royal  Duck,  dusky  black  and 
white,  must  be  the  biggest  duck  in  the  world; 
one  we  got  measured  thirty-two  inches,  which 
is  nearly  as  big  as  our  Bean  Goose  and  consider- 
ably bigger  than  our  Bernacle.  He  is  really  a 
splendid  trophy,  with  his  chocolate-black  body 
and  clear  white  wing  patches.  There  were  a 
lot  about,  but  they  were  not  easy  to  get :  I  saw 
them  chiefly  at  flight,  a  long  way  off  usually. 
The  other  duck  we  got  were  the  White- Faced 
Tree-Duck,  and  the  beautiful  little  Brazilian 
Teal,  with  his  iridescent  plumage  and  his 


180  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

orange-red  bill  and  feet.  These  teal  had  not, 
I  think,  begun  to  lay  :  at  any  rate  the  duck  had 
not  begun  to  sit,  for  she  and  the  drake  were 
always  about  all  day  together.  We  shot  a  good 
many ;  they  were  very  easy  to  get. 

The  open  part  of  the  Chaco,  the  campo, 
swarms  with  small  birds.  Every  reed-bed  is 
full  of  them,  chattering  and  twittering  and 
flicking  lightly  from  stem  to  stem.  Very  few 
was  I  able  to  identify.  In  the  first  place,  I  was 
desperately  keen  to  get  something  with  the  rifle; 
and  every  available  minute  was  spent  at  that. 
But  also,  if  you  are  to  identify  small  birds  you 
must,  unless  they  are  conspicuous  or  brightly 
coloured,  shoot  them;  and  that,  as  I  was  not 
collecting,  was  a  senseless  slaughter.  Big  birds 
and  middle-sized  ones  you  can  identify,  with 
patience  and  a  pair  of  glasses;  but  small  ones 
you  cannot,  unless  your  time  is  unlimited. 
Accordingly  my  list  is  shockingly  meagre.  The 
common  marsh  birds  were  there.  There  was 
the  well-known  mottled  yellow  and  black  one, 
the  size  of  our  blackbird,  the  Yellow- Shouldered 
Marsh-Bird,  with  its  nest  attached  to  reeds 
growing  in  the  water,  and  its  brown  spotted 
eggs,  and  the  Red-Breasted  Marsh-Bird  also. 
More  lovely  and  less  common  was  the  Yellow- 
Headed  Marsh-Bird,  like  a  Golden  Oriole  as 
Mr.  Hudson  truly  says,  with  its  jet  black  and 
clear  gold.  Then  there  was  the  Red-Billed 
Ground-Finch:  and  that  beautiful  nest  builder 


THE    BIRDS.  181 

the  Hang-Nest  (though  this  is  a  bird  of  the 
mont£,  not  of  the  campo)  who  weaves  together  a 
long  pocket,  like  a  string  bag,  and  hangs  it 
from  a  bough. 

This  is  a  most  meagre  result.  Let  it  be 
remembered  that  I  had  no  one  who  knew  the 
small  birds  well  and  could  point  them  out  and 
give  one  a  start.  It  had  been  different  in 
Uruguay,  where  in  a  day  or  two  I  had  been 
taught  the  common  birds.  I  knew  the  impudent 
Bienteveo,  looking  at  you  with  his  head  cocked 
on  one  side,  like  our  jay :  the  efficient,  noisy 
Oven  Bird,  building  his  solid  mud  cupola :  the 
Cardinal,  with  his  grey  soutane  and  brilliant 
crimson  cap  :  the  little  Fire  King,  flicking  on 
and  off  a  bough  like  our  flycatcher,  his  scarlet 
head  glowing  like  a  coal :  the  Widow  Bird,  her 
white  wedding  dress  edged  with  narrow  black 
mourning :  the  Scissor-Tail,  on  a  windy  day, 
wondering  why  nature  gave  him  so  inconvenient 
an  appendage  :  the  Pigmy  Dove,  no  bigger  than 
a  thrush,  building  her  little  nest  of  twigs  in  an 
orange  tree  :  the  Lenatero,  the  Stick  Bird,  who 
tries  to  see  how  big  a  nest  he  can  make,  how 
conspicuous  and  in  how  small  a  tree :  all  these 
and  many  more  I  knew.  But  none  of  these  were 
here.  I  was  in  foreign  parts,  where  the 
appearance,  the  manners  and  the  language  of 
the  inhabitants  were  all  new  to  me. 

The  big  birds  were  easier,  particularly  the 
birds  of  prey,  for  these  are  much  the  same  all 


182  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

over  the  world  :  not  the  same  birds,  of  course, 
but  the  same  in  type;  and  they  keep  closer  to 
type  than  do  other  families.  If  you  have  once 
got  into  your  head  the  flight  of  a  falcon  or  a 
buzzard  or  a  kite  or  a  harrier  you  can  tell  them 
apart  all  the  world  over.  There  are  some,  of 
course,  peculiar  to  South  America,  such  as  the 
well-known  scavengers,  half  hawk,  half  vulture, 
the  Carancho  and  the  Chimango.  You  have 
only  to  kill  an  animal  or  throw  down  any  offai 
to  collect  a  crowd  of  these,  together  with  their 
vile  cousin,  the  Black  Vulture. 

What  a  bird  lover  misses  in  England  is  the 
big  birds.  Possibly  our  small  birds  were  never 
so  numerous  as  they  are  now,  for  their  enemies 
such  as  weasels  and  hawks  are  extirpated,  our 
immense  game  covers  form  ideal  sanctuaries, 
and  in  many  instances  they  and  their  eggs  are 
protected  by  law.  But  with  big  birds  it  is 
different,  especially  birds  of  prey.  How  often 
do  you  see  a  buzzard  or  peregrine  ?  Have  you 
ever  seen  an  English  kite,  except  stuffed  1  Game 
preservers  and  egg-collectors  make  them  rarer 
and  rarer,  except  in  the  north  and  west.  But 
in  South  America  it  is  different.  You  can 
never  look  into  the  upper  air  without  seeing  it 
peopled  by  its  rightful  inhabitants,  birds  of 
prey.  There  they  are,  eagles  and  vultures, 
harriers  and  buzzards,  soaring  and  swinging, 
heads  moving  from  side  to  side,  eyes  fixed  on 
the  earth.  I  remember  one  occasion  particu- 


THE     BIRDS.  183 

larly.  It  was  the  first  day  in  the  Chaco.  Our 
mule  was  steadily  pulling  the  trolley  containing 
our  kit  along  the  narrow  disused  track.  We 
had  not  made  fast  progress,  for  more  than  once 
the  trolley  had  left  the  rails,  and  for  many  miles 
the  grass  was  so  high  and  thick  over  the  track 
that  we  had  to  burn  it  before  we  got  through. 
But  by  now  we  were  some  way  inland  and  night 
was  approaching.  I  took  a  rifle  and  started 
for  a  river  a  couple  of  miles  ahead,  where  I 
might  get  a  shot.  I  did  not,  but  my  time  was 
not  wasted.  We  were  passing  through  a  wide 
plain,  perfectly  flat,  covered  with  coarse  grass 
and  rimmed  on  the  far  horizon  by  a  line  of  dark 
forest.  On  the  right,  some  way  off,  was  a  large 
marsh,  to  which  ibis  of  different  kinds  were 
winging  their  way,  and  flocks  of  snowy  egrets 
and  tall  black  and  white  storks.  But  it  was  not 
they  who  interested  me,  it  was  the  birds  of 
prey.  Low  down,  quartering  the  plain,  swing- 
ing into  the  wind,  came  drove  on  drove  of  the 
hunters.  On  they  came,  the  insolent  lords  of 
the  air,  passing  away  overhead,  replaced  by 
others  as  far  as  the  eye  could  reach,  searching 
the  ground  up  and  down  and  backwards  and 
forwards,  restlessly  seeking  their  meat.  They 
did  not  find  much.  All  the  time  I  watched  I 
did  not  see  a  single  one  swoop  or  pitch,  and 
most  of  them  must  have  gone  to  bed  supperless. 
But  on  and  on  they  came,  in  untiring  succession, 
of  all  sizes  and  shapes  and  of  every  different 


184  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

make  and  flight.  It  was  a  wonderful  sight,  in 
that  wild  country,  with  the  quick  night  falling. 
I  watched  until  the  trolley  caught  me  up  and  we 
had  to  push  on  to  get  across  the  river  and  choose 
a  camping  ground  before  dark.  The  variety 
was  endless.  At  the  time  it  was  impossible  to 
identify  more  than  a  few;  but  then  and  later 
several  were  made  out.  There  was  a  great  kite 
with  a  white  head,  of  which  one  shot  subse- 
quently measured  four  and  a  half  feet  across 
the  wings.  There  were  buzzards,  of  which  at 
least  one,  the  White-Tailed  Buzzard,  was 
clearly  made  out.  There  was  the  long  narrow- 
winged  harrier  called  the  Cinereous  or 
Argentine  Harrier.  And  there  was  the  most 
uncommon  looking  of  the  lot,  the  Sociable 
Marsh-Hawk,  which  has  a  body  of  clear  grey- 
blue,  black  wings,  a  white  bar  on  a  black  tail, 
ruby  eyes  and  orange  bill  and  feet.  There  were 
many  more.  It  was  not  the  particular  identifi- 
cation which  was  interesting  (though  all  true 
lovers  long  to  identify)  but  the  wild  and  free 
life  in  which  for  a  moment  I  shared. 

Every  poison  provides  its  own  antidote,  and 
Paraguay,  which  breeds  more  stinging  insects 
to  the  acre  than  any  other  country,  also  pro- 
duces a  tobacco  which  the  boldest  of  them  cannot 
face.  Let  him  who  goes  to  the  Paraguayan 
Chaco  take  with  him  a  bundle  of  Paraguayan 
cigars.  You  want  something  to  protect  you 
when  you  are  sitting  in  the  shade  of  one  of  her 


DRYING    THE    MEAT. 


A    PARAGUAYAN    STAG. 


(To  face  p.  18< 


THE    BIRDS.  186 

lovely  woods.  These  woods  are  far  more  varied 
and  open  than  those  which  border  the  Parana. 
There  they  are  close  and  thick;  if  you  would 
walk  through  them,  your  way  must  be  cut  with 
a  machete :  and,  when  you  have  penetrated 
some  distance,  you  reach  a  land  of  silence.  Not 
a  sound  is  heard,  not  even  the  note  of  a  bird : 
not  a  flower  is  to  be  seen  :  on  all  sides  stretches 
the  forest,  impenetrable  and  sombre.  It  is 
different  in  the  Chaco;  there  you  can  usually 
walk  without  cutting  your  way :  and  you 
always  find  open  spots,  either  glades  or  patches, 
which  let  in  air  and  sunlight.  This  has  a 
powerful  effect  on  their  character.  They  are 
neither  empty,  nor  silent :  birds  haunt  them  : 
and  they  are  full  of  sound  and  colour. 

There  are  several  sounds  which  make  up  the 
impression  the  forest  leaves  on  you,  as  you  sit 
in  the  shade  during  the  hot,  still  noon.  Under 
all  is  the  subdued  hum  of  countless  insects, 
inseparably  connected  with  hot  days  every- 
where, a  musical  and  resonant  note,  born  of  the 
heat  and  the  stillness.  Then  there  is  the 
peaceful  sleepy  call  of  the  Spotted  Dove.  That 
also  is  an  underlying  and  all-pervading  sound, 
for  you  cannot  tell  whence  it  comes,  and  it 
seems  to  be  part  of  the  air  itself.  Quite 
different,  harsh  and  distinct,  there  comes  from 
a  distance  the  unmistakeable  scream  of  parrots. 
But  you  will  not  have  been  seated  long  before 
you  will  be  conscious  of  movement  as  well  as 


186  THE    GOLDEN    RIVER. 

sound.  A  woodpecker,  yellow  barred  with 
brown,  his  crest  golden,  will  fly  on  to  the  trunk 
of  a  tree,  and  begin  tap  tapping.  A  pretty 
little  hawk,  mottled  brown  with  a  black  head, 
flicks  across  the  open.  A  Humming  Bird,  the 
common  one  of  South  America,  iridescent  green 
with  a  red  beak,  suddenly  appears  feeding  on 
the  pale  flesh-coloured  trumpets  of  a  creeper, 
whirring  like  a  moving  shadow  from  blossom  to 
blossom,  until  he  disappears  at  a  pace  which 
no  eye  can  follow.  A  pair  of  delightful  jays 
will  begin  to  take  an  interest  in  you.  Nature 
clearly  has  marked  these  birds  out  as  comedians, 
for  she  has  dressed  them  in  black  and  white 
suits,  and  given  them  staring  yellow  eyes,  with 
bright  blue  stripes  over.  But  the  most  tame, 
the  most  confidential,  and  the  most  amusing  of 
all  is  the  bird  called  Urraca.  Urraca  is  Spanish 
for  magpie,  and  is  I  know  applied  to  other 
South  American  birds;  what  this  particular 
bird  is  I  know  not,  but  he  is  the  same  size  as 
our  jackdaw,  and  clearly  his  cousin.  His  colour 
is  greyish  purple,  which  becomes  bluish  purple 
on  the  wings  and  tail,  and  his  beak  and  claws 
are  black.  The  first  thing  you  notice  is  their 
soft  musical  caw,  constantly  repeated  and 
getting  nearer  and  nearer,  and  then  you  will 
see  the  two  birds  hopping  restlessly  from  twig 
to  twig,  and  putting  their  heads  on  one  side  to 
get  a  better  look  at  you.  They  are  most 
inquisitive  and  tame,  and  delight  in  perching 


THE     BIRDS.  187 

over  your  head,  nearer  and  nearer,  looking  at 
you  now  from  one  angle  and  now  from  another, 
and  discussing  you  ceaselessly  the  whole  time. 

The  last  bird  to  be  described  is  the  stupidest 
and  at  the  same  time  the  most  useful  of  the  lot. 
This  is  the  one  called  the  pheasant :  I  do  not 
know  his  proper  name.  He  is  rather  smaller 
than  a  hen  pheasant,  has  a  beak  like  the 
domestic  chicken  and  a  square  tail  of  reddish 
brown.  He  sits  in  the  trees,  and  never  flies 
except  from  bough  to  bough.  You  can  walk  up 
to  him  and  shoot  him  sitting  with  a  rifle  or 
indeed  a  shot  gun.  At  dawn  and  dusk  he 
advertises  his  presence  by  a  silly  cackling,  like 
a  farmyard  hen.  He  is  always  on  the  spot, 
always  tells  you  where  he  is,  and  is  delicious  to 
eat.  You  need  never  go  hungry  where  pheasants 
are. 

That  concludes  the  birds.  There  are  many 
more  which  might  be  mentioned.  I  have  seen 
the  famous  Crested  Screamer,  about  which  Mr. 
Hudson  has  told  so  much.  I  have  seen,  though 
perhaps  too  far  off  to  be  certain,  the  Jabirii, 
that  great  white  stork  which  stands  five  feet 
high.  As  I  sit  here,  thinking  of  that  time, 
there  are  many  more  birds  which  come  into  the 
mind.  I  shall  not  describe  them :  for  the 
reader  will  weary  of  the  length  of  the  list,  and 
the  ornithologist  must  long  ago  have  given 
me  up. 


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